Headlines
Lalit Modi praises Modi: Ex-IPL chief seeks to mend fences with PM
New Delhi, June 27
The man who is instrumental
in inviting the wrath of the opposition on the ruling Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) and its leader Narendra Modi now appears to be seeking to
make amends, after the party said it would seek an interpol 'red corner
notice' against him.
Lalit Modi, sitting in London, tweeted on Saturday that Prime Minister Modi was a "most savy (sic) man".
The
former chief of the Indian Premier League, embroiled in several
controversies and whose passport was revoked by the Indian government,
said that "when he (Modi) bats, he will hit the ball out of the park".
Lalit
Modi, who has been putting out reams of information through tweets and
other media, was apparently helped by External Foreign Minister Sushma
Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhra Raje, at a time when he
was being sought by the Enforcement Directorate during the previous
United Progressive Alliance regime.
Modi's tweet praising the
prime minister came on the day Raje was in Delhi, for an official
meeting, but was planning to meet the BJP brass to give her side of the
story. According to sources, she was expected to meet the prime
minister, but latest reports said that the meeting had not come through.
Raje
has accepted that she had signed a document supporting the application
of Lalit Modi for a residence visa in Britain. The opposition parties
say that at best this points to an impropriety by a leading BJP leader
when the IPL chief was wanted by the authorities in India.
Lalit
Modi, who has been staying in London for several years, is sought by the
Enforcement Directorate for alleged financial irregularities when he
was the IPL head.
He has been tweeting regularly, often implying nothing more than a meeting with political figures.
On Friday he said that he and senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal had chatted over three days during a wedding in Istanbul.
Earlier
the same day, Modi tweeted that he "bumped into" Congress president
Sonia Gandhi's daughter Priyanka and her husband Robert Vadra in a
London restaurant last year.
He did not imply any wrongdoing or
impropriety on their part. But the BJP, under attack for "supporting a
fugitive", immediately reacted asking the Congress president to explain
what the meeting between the three was all about.