Union Minister Piyush Goyal responded to the allegations levelled against Jay Shah, the son of BJP President Amit Shah, in an article published by The Wire on 8 October. Goyal termed the article “derogatory, defamatory, hollow and baseless.”
The article alleged that Jay Shah’s company enjoyed 16,000-fold growth in the year following the election of Narendra Modi as prime minister and the elevation of Shah to the post of party president.
Goyal said that Jay Shah will file both a civil and criminal defamation suit against the author and the publication at the Ahmedabad High Court.
He said that Shah was a “legitimate” businessman and that the article was trying to damage the reputation of his father, Amit Shah.
Jay Shah will file a criminal defamation suit of Rs 100 crore against the author of the article, the editor and the owner of news website The Wire.Piyush Goyal
What Does ‘The Wire’ Article Allege?
The Wire, in a report titled 'The Golden Touch of Jay Amit Shah', alleged that turnover of Temple Enterprise Private Ltd, a company owned by Amit Shah's son Jay Shah, grew from Rs 50,000 in March 2015 to Rs 80.5 crore in 2015-16. The increase in revenue rose to Rs 51 crore of foreign earnings, from zero earnings the previous year, the article alleged.
In the same financial year, Temple Enterprise got access to an unsecured loan of Rs 15.78 crore from financial services firm KIFS. According to the article, the revenue of KIFS for the same year was Rs 7 crore.
Responding on behalf of Jay Shah, his lawyer said to The Wire:
Jay Shah, Jitendra Shah and their associates invested share capital and unsecured loans in this company [Temple Enterprise]. Since working capital facilities were not available to a new business/company, interest bearing Inter Corporate Deposits (ICD) were taken from time to time from KIFS Financial Services Ltd., a registered NBFC, to run this business. Tax has been deducted on the interest paid (TDS) regularly and the principal and interest amount has been repaid in full.
Quoting RoC filings, The Wire reported that Jay Shah's Temple Enterprise was described as"wholesale trade and where more than 95% of revenues come from the sale of agricultural products".
The report also claims that Jay Shah’s other company, Kusum Finserve, incorporated in July 2015 got inter-corporate deposits from KIFS Financial worth Rs 2.6 crore in FY 2014-15, and a loan of Rs 4.9 crore from an unnamed source.
This entity has also been regularly raising ICDs/loans from KIFS Financial Services for the last several years and the amount of Rs 4.9 crore was the outstanding closing balance from them. These amounts were used for regular working capital. Tax has been deducted on the interest paid (TDS) and principal and interest amount has been repaid in full.Amit Shah’s Lawyer
The partnership also reportedly availed a loan of a Rs 10.35 crore from a public sector undertaking, Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA) in March 2016. The PSU was under the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, headed at that time by Union Minister Piyush Goyal.
Responding to question raised by the reporter, Shah’s lawyer responded by saying:
The loan taken from IREDA for setting up a 2.1 MW wind energy plant is based on the equipment prices prevailing at that point of time as per industry standards (approx Rs 14.3 crore) and duly appraised and sanctioned in the normal course of business. The outstanding loan as on 30-06-2017 is Rs 8.52 crore and interest and repayment of loan are regular.
Article “Completely Malicious”
Goyal described the article as “completely malicious”, and said that the BJP rejected any allegation sought to be made against Jay Shah or any of their leaders.
He said that the name ‘Jay Amit Shah’ was used in the headline, and that by giving this “mischievous title” the article was trying to defame the BJP president.
Following the publication of the article, both Congress and AAP have demanded a probe into the allegations levelled in it.
Amit Malviya, BJP's IT Cell chief, tweeted Jay Shah’s statement, which said that “those republishing or rebroadcasting the article, either directly or indirectly, will also be guilty of the same criminal/civil liability”.
(With ANI inputs)
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