Tehelka case: Kapil Sibal accuses BJP, RSS of vilifying him

NEW DELHI: Stung by BJP's attack in the Tehelka case, Law Minister Kapil Sibal today hit back at the principal Opposition and the RSS, accusing them of vilifying his name and said magazine's editor Tarun Tejpal was not related to him and he does not hold shares in the entity.

Hours after Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj tweeted that a "Union Cabinet Minister who is the founder and patron of Tehelka is shielding Tarun Tejpal," Sibal said leaders who are "tangentially talking about me should name me if they have the courage."

Swaraj had not named anyone in the tweet. The Congress leader also referred to a message in circulation in the social media which said that Tejpal is the son of Sibal's real sister and that the Union minister held 80 per cent shares in Tehelka.

"There is a message going around in the social media which says that Tarun Tejpal is the son of a Punjab Congress Committee member and an MLA. I don't know...

"Then it says his mother is the real sister of Kapil Sibal. Now, I am sorry, I did not expect the RSS and the BJP to stoop to this level. They can attack me politically, but they should not bring my family into it," he told reporters here.

Sibal said he has only one sister, Asha Nanda, who lives in Maharani Bagh here. "I have no other sister," he said.

"...because I have been attacking (Narendra) Modi and attacking the BJP, obviously for them this is the only way to spread lie and to vilify my name. And if they have the courage they should name me. These political leaders who are tangentially talking about me should name me if they have the courage," he said.

Referring to claims that he held 80 per cent shares in Tehelka magazine till 2011, he said, "I don't even have a single share. No share has ever been alloted to me."