A press conference organised by Congress for Opposition parties' Presidential candidate Yashwant Sinha in Bhopal on Thursday was dominated by allegations that legislators are being bribed to vote in favour of National Democratic Alliance candidate Droupadi Murmu.
While Mr. Sinha accused the BJP of offering a "huge sum of money to non-BJP MLAs” to vote against him, Congress State president and former Chief Minister Kamal Nath said the BJP had approached a Congress MLA with an offer of ₹1 crore.
“Can there be a bigger crime in democracy than buying MLAs? … I was taken aback to read a news item headlined 'BJP eyeing 26 tribal MLAs of Congress, cross-voting preparations on' in a leading daily. One of the Congress MLAs told me about how much pressure he faced during my meeting with legislators. Do we want this kind of politics in India?” asked Mr. Sinha.
Earlier, Mr. Nath too made similar allegations. “The BJP approached one of our MLAs and told him that he would be paid ₹1 crore to cross-vote in the Presidential elections. I have complete faith in my MLAs that they would vote for our candidate,” he said.
Another Congress MLA Panchilal Meda claimed that he was offered a ministerial berth by the State government in exchange for voting for the NDA candidate.
There was also a brief power cut while Mr. Nath was addressing the media. Mr. Sinha quipped that it was done intentionally, in an apparent dig at the BJP-ruled State government.
The allegations came hours after State Home Minister Narottam Mishra appealed to Congress MPs, including Rajya Sabha member Digvijay Singh, to vote for the NDA's presidential candidate.
Denying the Congress’ allegations, Mr. Mishra said, "Why would we indulge in such acts, especially when the entire nation knows that NDA candidate Murmu is going to win by a huge margin?"
Mr. Sinha said he will visit his home States of Bihar and Jharkhand in the next two days before the campaign comes to an end.
The Presidential polls will be held on July 18.
