With Rahul Gandhi remaining unfazed over a parliamentary notice related to his United Kingdom citizenship, BJP leader Subramanian Swamy on Monday said the documents filed in the case are ‘original’ since it has the Congress vice president’s signature.
“These documents are true because they were filed by Rahul Gandhi in his capacity as company secretary and he is certainly responsible for it and his signature is available in the records,” Swamy said.
“The committee had felt that there was a prima facie case to issue a notice, so, they issued a showcause notice asking him to explain the truth of the documents that have been submitted” he added.
Swamy alleged that Gandhi had floated a company called Backops Limited in 2003 in the United Kingdom, and in the annual return form, he had declared himself to be of British nationality with a UK address.
“Under Article 9 of the Constitution and Article 18 in both ways, no Indian citizen can have any other country’s citizenship. Some country allow dual citizenship but we don’t, so he loses his citizenship and once he loses the citizenship ultimately he loses the membership from the parliament,” he added.
Gandhi unfazed
The Congress vice president on Monday appeared unfazed after a notice was served to him by over his citizenship as his party accused the Centre of carrying out personal attacks to divert attention from more urgent issues.
“We will deal with that,” Gandhi told reporters when asked about a show-cause notice issued by the ethics committee of Parliament, asking whether he declared himself a British citizen to float a firm in the UK.
A member of the parliamentary ethics committee, Arjun Ram Meghwal told ANI it was a very serious matter and the committee would discuss the further course of action once the Congress vice-president responds.
Meanwhile, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi asked Rahul Gandhi to make his stand clear with regard to the showcause notice.
“If he is a citizen of some country then he should make it clear. And if he is not making it clear then there is something wrong. If the ethics committee has issued a notice to him then he should definitely make it clear,” Naqvi told ANI here.
