Congress on Wednesday termed as "height of fertile imagination" the controversy surrounding land-lease in Gurgaon to Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust and accused the Opposition of putting public interest behind political gains in making an issue out of nothing.
"There are political parties as well as persons who are tilting the windmills at non-existent facts. These are heights of fertile imagination. This is a campaign based on misinformation and disinformation.
"No farmer land has been acquired for the trust. Therefore, there is no question of the deacquisition of land exemption for the trust. The trust was given the land belonging to a gram sabha merely on lease for running the hospital and carrying out charitable work," party spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi told reporters.
Singhvi's reaction came on a day, when stepping up its attack on the ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party demanded the resignation of Haryana Chief Minister M Bhupinder Singh Hooda for "illegal" denotification and lease of land to the trust.
Singhvi urged for looking at the issue with a sense of balance and criticised the media for reporting on the issue "without checking the facts". Singhvi said that the trust had applied for lease of the gram panchayat land and the latter, under the established rules, even offered to lease it out to the trust at concessional rates.
He said that the trust declined to take the land lease at any concessional rate and paid for the allotment at the existing market rate. The Congress spokesperson said that the trust was leased out at only 5.3 acre land and not hundreds of acres as projected in sections of media.
"It was not any individual's or farmer's land. What is its comparison to Bhatta-Parsaul where poor farmers' land was taken and sold to builders at high prices,"?
"What is the error, illegality or crime" in this lease? he asked, adding that it is being opposed by those who are against public interest and welfare of the aam admi.
