Responding to the story published by The Wire, Union Minister Piyush Goyal told the media that Amit Shah’s son, Jay Shah, would be filing a Rs 100 crore criminal defamation complaint against Rohini Singh, author of the article, the editor and the owner of The Wire.
Published on October 8, The Wire‘s story uses Registrar of Companies’ filings of Jay Shah’s company Temple Enterprise Private Ltd to show “a dramatic increase in some of his [Jay Shah’s] businesses since Narendra Modi became prime minister”.
Calling the article an attempt to damage Amit Shah’s reputation, Goyal said, “Jay Shah will file civil and criminal prosecution for defamation in Ahmedabad Court.” Quoting the article that stated that the turnover of the Jay Shah-owned company increased by 16,000 times, Goyal said, “Using the figure 16,000 is just an attempt to sensationalise the matter.” He also added that using Jay Shah’s name in the title was a “mischievous” attempt.
Even as Goyal defends both the Shahs in a press conference, Jay Shah has issued a statement which calling The Wire’s article “false, derogatory and defamatory”.
Interestingly, the concluding lines of the statement warn “anyone” against “republishing” or “rebroadcasting the imputations made in the article”.
BJP and Shah’s statements come right at the heels of Congress’ and AAP’s demand for a probe into the firm owned by Jay Shah. Hours after Singh’s story became public, senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal addressed a press conference at the Congress headquarters and said, “We want to ask our Prime Minister what you now think about crony capitalism. Will you direct the CBI to probe?” Sibal added, “Our appeal to the Prime Minister is that you are the pradhan sevak ….you always say na khaunga, na khane dunga….toh nahin khane dijiye.” Also, refering to The Wire’s piece Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi tweeted:
The Aam Aadmi Party also held a press conference where AAP leader Ashuthosh said a FIR should be registered against Jay Shah and a probe should be ordered into his company’s activities, The Indian Express reported.