Anti-corruption crusaders Arvind Kejriwal and Kiran Bedi, tried their best to pacify hostile media at a press conference in New Delhi on Thursday evening but could not say much in defence of Shanti Bhushan and his son Prashant.
In his opening statement Kejriwal said that they have filed a petition before the Supreme Court asking it to set up an independent probe committee or constitute s Special Investigating Team to conduct an impartial probe into the CD controversy throwing allegations against the Bhushans.
"We have come here to clarify that the Bhushans are not planning to resign and we all stand by them. We have asked for an SIT to be set up by the Supreme Court to conduct a thorough probe into our backgrounds and even the funds received by the NGO's. We have been seeing reports on television media about the Central Forensic Laboratory report. We do not accept it as the report that we have from United States says that the CD has been tempered with," Kejriwal said.
When a journalist asked why Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan have been made members of the joint drafting committee, Kejriwal said that it was decided that those who had drafted the Jan Lokpal bill would become members of the joint committee set up by the government and since the Bhushan's were part of the original team, they were automatically named.
He denied that the two farm houses allotted to Shanti Bhushan and his other advocate son Jayant Bhushan got them through discretionary quota of the Uttar Pradesh chief
minister whose cases they have taken up on her behalf.
"These plots were neither a gift nor were given to them under discretionary quota," he claimed.
"Whatever plots that were allotted to them were after fulfilling the entire conditions. They have gone on record that they do not mind if the allotment is cancelled," he said.
But he refused to answer a question as to why did the Bhushans accept the allotment in the first place.
Kiran Bedi had no answer when asked how she can disown the CFSL report on the basis of which, she as a former officer of Delhi police, had been prosecuting the accused persons.
