Romesh ISI agent: Advani

SAWAI MADHOPUR, Nov 23 (PTI) — The Union Home Minister, Mr L.K. Advani, today said he had asked the investigating agencies to probe the political links of Romesh Sharma, alleged frontman of Dubai-based don Dawood Ibrahim, as he had been said to be acting as an agent of the Pakistani ISI in Delhi.

"I have asked the agencies to find out under whose political blessings Sharma could amass such huge wealth and act with impunity for several years as an agent of the ISI in the national capital," Mr Advani told an election meeting in this eastern Rajasthan district hours before the end of campaigning.

Making a scathing attack on the Congress, the Home Minister said a series of scandals was the hallmark of that party’s rule with Bofors, JMM MPs' bribery case and urea deal among the latest scams.

Stating that corruption not only hampered development but also affected the national security, he said this had been again brought into sharp focus by the Romesh Sharma affair.

He appealed to the people to vote for the BJP to ensure corruption-free governance. The Vajpayee government, he said, was committed to providing good governance. The BJP government in Rajasthan had done massive developmental work in the past five years.

Sawai Madhopur constituency is witnessing a triangular contest among Narendra Kanwar, Minister of State for Tourism (BJP), Yasmeen Abrar, wife of former Union Minister, Abrar Ahmed (Congress) and Motilal Meena (JD).

Mr Advani charged Congress and CPM with joining hands only to destabilise the BJP-led government and said the exercise would prove futile.

The new-found affinity between the two parties was an attempt at survival by the CPM, while for the Congress, it betrayed the inability of its leaders to stay out of power for long, Mr Advani told newsmen in Jaipur.

"The Congress could not develop the strength to sit in the opposition and the party was up to its divisive tricks even during the United Front government," he alleged.

The Congress, which based its election campaign `only on onion', was out to grab power by any `jod-tod' (mix-and-match), Mr Advani said.

"It is not just a coincidence that the Congress President Sonia Gandhi and the West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu shared a common platform in Delhi to criticise the BJP-led government and praise each other," he said.

The last time that the two parties had come together was to counter Jaiprakash Narain’s movement against corruption.

Mr Advani claimed the onion-potato crisis was not the main poll issue. All-round development attempted by the BJP’s state governments and the Centre would determine the poll outcome.

The Home Minister said after Assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh would be a separate state with its own Assembly and elected legislators.

Referring to the BJP poster in a Hindi national daily criticising the Congress, which the Election Commission had `deplored' yesterday, he said the party would file its reply to the commission when asked.