New Delhi: Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi, at the centre of a controversy over the discovery of a wad of currency notes in the Upper House, said that he was astonished to hear about it.
He has called for a thorough investigation and examination of the CCTV footage to get to the bottom of it and also suggested that every House member should be given a lock and key to rule out any security breach, in their absence.
Singhvi, issuing a clarification over the controversy, said that he was in the House only for three minutes on Thursday and added that he carries only Rs 500 in his purse.
Chaos broke out in Rajya Sabha on Friday morning after Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar informed the House that a wad of currency notes was recovered by security officials during the anti-sabotage check on Thursday.
The wad of notes was recovered from seat no 222, the one allotted to Abhishek Manu Singhvi, the Congress MP from Telangana.
Singhvi, sharing details of his stay in the Parliament on Thursday, said, “I am quite astonished to even hear about it. I never heard of it. I reached the inside of the House yesterday at 12.57 P.M. The House rose at 1 P.M. From 1 to 1.30 P.M., I sat with Ayodhya Prasad in the canteen and had lunch. At 1.30 P.M., I left Parliament. So my total stay in the House yesterday was three minutes and my stay in the canteen was 30 minutes.
“I find it bizarre that even on such issues politics is being done,” he added.
The Congress MP also called for a detailed probe into the incident, including the scanning of all the CCTV footage to identify the culprit.
“Of course, there must be an enquiry as to how people can come and put anything anywhere in any seat. It means that each of us must have a seat where the seat itself can be locked and the key can be carried home by the MP because anybody can then do things on the seat and make allegations about this,” he added.
He also demanded that security agencies be brought under the lens to investigate the failure on their part.
“Everybody should cooperate in getting to the bottom of this and if there is a failing in the security agencies that must also be completely exposed,” he stated.
(IANS)
