Guwahati: Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has filed a criminal defamation case against Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia.
Sisodia is the target of a lawsuit alleging that he improperly awarded contracts for PPE equipment when Sarma was the state’s minister of health during the Sonowal administration.
The deputy chief minister of Delhi said that the current chief minister of Assam who was the health minister at the time had grossly overpaid for PPE kits by a company affiliated with his wife.
Meanwhile, Sisodia has already been sued for defamation for Rs 100 crore by Sarma’s wife Riniki Bhuyan Sarma.
“Himanta Biswa Sarma awarded the contract to his wife’s company. He paid ₹ 990 for the PPE kits while others were purchased at ₹ 600 apiece from another company on the same day. This is a huge crime,” Mr Sisodia had said while levelling the allegations earlier this month.
Sisodia asserted that he had the paperwork to back up his claim.
Mr. Sarma had then informed Mr. Sisodia that he would “meet you soon in Guwahati as you will face criminal defamation.”
New Delhi-based ‘The Wire’ and Guwahati-based ‘The Crosscurrent’, the digital media organizations on June 1 had in a joint investigative report claimed that the Assam government had placed four COVID-19 related emergency medical supply orders, most likely without following proper process.
The media sites claimed that all four orders, placed between March 18 and March 23, 2020 were won by three enterprises controlled by Riniki Bhuyan Sarma and the family’s business partner Ghanshyam Dhanuka. They did this by referencing a number of Right to Information responses.
However, Riniki Bhuyan Sarma who said that she did not receive “a single dime” for them, has denied any wrongdoing in the supply of PPE kits to the National Health Mission.
The Assam government and Sarma have each categorically refuted any allegations that members of the chief minister’s family were complicit in the alleged wrongdoings. They have also referred to the accusations as “false, fictitious, spiteful, and of entrenched interests.”