Not mole,but opium haunts Jaswant now

JAIPUR: Following the tradition can be dangerous at times, and this time around Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Jaswant Singh has had a bitter taste of the fact. A personal complaint petition has been filed in the special Jodhpur NDPS court against Mr Singh and nine other Rajasthan BJP leaders for being in possession of opium milk water (kesar). The court is will take up the matter on Saturday.

The petitioner, Om Prakash Vishnoi, told ET over phone that if convicted, the accused could get a maximum sentence of 10 years and a fine of Rs 1 lakh for possessing opium. “The petition has been filed under Sections 8, 17, 18, 27 and 29 of the Narcotic Drugs Psychotropic Substance (NDPS) Act.

Besides Mr Singh, three cabinet ministers of Raje government - education minister Ghanshyam Tiwari, industries minister Narpat Singh Razvi and social justice minister Madan Dilawar - chief whip Mahavir Prasad Jain and senior BJP leaders Lalit Kishore Chaturvedi, Raghuvir Singh Kaushal, Kailash Meghwal, Jogeshwar Garg and Shankar Singh have also been accused for apparently sniffing and sharing the narcotic drug in a function hosted by the former Union minister at his home in his village,” Mr Vishnoi said.

On Wednesday, Mr Singh had hosted a party for the state BJP dissidents to at his ancestral house at Jasol, where he welcomed them by offering kesar from his palm - a tradition of greeting the guests in the Marwar region. Mr Singh had also invited BJP president Rajnath Singh and senior leader L K Advani for this function, but they could not attend the function. Incidentally, neither the chief minister nor any of her loyalists were invited for this function called Riyan in the local dialect.

However, Mr Singh had denied serving opium at the gathering. “It’s an old tradition to serve opium in functions like Riyan when the near and dear ones, and even people from the nearby villages, are invited when a family has got some good news. But, yesterday (on Thursday), at my place, no opium was served as it was a mix of Ganga jal, kesar, jaggery and tea,” he said. The former minister had also explained the chief minister’s absence, saying, “In such religious ceremonies, women are not invited.”