Nationalist Congress Party (SP) chief and veteran politician Sharad Pawar Saturday said he had expressed his opposition to former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the amendments brought by former Union finance minister P Chidambaram to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), but those were not accepted.
“I was in the Union Cabinet. When the amendment was brought in the PMLA by Chidambaram… I opposed it. I told this to then Prime Minister that… it will be misused. But my point was not accepted,” Pawar said, adding it was Chidambaram himself who fell victim to this amendment.
“I also feared that this Act will be used against the Opposition,” he said. Pawar was speaking at the launch of (UBT) MP Sanjay Raut’s book ‘Narkatla Swarg (Heaven in Hell)’, a memoir of his three months in Arthur Road Jail after he was arrested by the ED over alleged financial irregularities in the Patra Chawl redevelopment project. He was later released on bail.
“According to me the first thing to do after change in power in the state and the Centre has to be to change these amendments in the Act used by the ED, which are against the basic rights of individuals and political parties,” said Pawar.
