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Mahajan waves 'internal' HTletter to show he didn't say it

Information and Broadcasting Minister and senior BJP leader Pramod Mahajan today came out with written evidence to show that the correspondent's copy regarding his reported statement equating Congress president Sonia Gandhi with White House intern Monica Lewinsky was distorted.

Producing a copy of a hand-written letter by Pramod Pagedar, Bombay bureau chief of the English daily Hindustan Times, to Bharat Bhushan, executive editor of the paper, Mahajan quoted Pagedar as saying that his story was distorted at the Delhi-end by someone for reasons best known to him or her concerned.

The distortion in the copy has been enhanced with such comments as 'clearly encouraged by the crowd's response..' 'and mahajan's spurious logic was lost on the crowd' in the last para of the copy, the letter said. "I think this is unfair as much to me as it is to Pramod Mahajan who did not utter certain words that have been attributed to him, giving the erroneous impression that he equates Sonia Gandhi with Monica Lewinsky," the letter said and added, "I shall be grateful if you (Bhushan) could carry a suitable clarification in our paper in this regard and help placing the record straight".

Mahajan said Hindustan Times was the only newspaper which had reported that he had allegedly equated Sonia Gandhi with Monica Lewinsky. Asked how he could lay his hands on Pagedar's letter, the I&B minister refused to disclose the source, saying, "As newsmen don't disclose their source, I am also not going to do so."

UNI

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