In a strange statement attempting to defend the law minister, Union steel minister Beni Prasad Verma on Monday said Salman Khurshid will not do any wrong for Rs 71 lakh, which is a “very small amount” for a minister. However, when he later realised his faux pas, he quickly retracted the remark, saying he had been misquoted.
“Salman Khursid is a responsible person... When he is saying there is no scam, he should be believed... I don’t think a person like Khurshid will do anything for an amount like `71 lakh. It is a very small amount for a central minister,” he told reporters here.
He was trying to defend his colleague who has been accused of misappropriating funds meant for the disabled through an NGO run by him and his wife Louise. “If it would have been `71 crore, even I would have been serious,” Verma said, adding that Khurshid should not resign.
However, when eyebrows were raised, Verma changed tack and said he was misquoted. “I had said that for `71 lakh, I don’t think he would have done anything like this. Corruption is corruption, let it involve `1 or `100 crore,” he said.
Verma then said that Khurshid was clean because he has filed a defamation suit. “Any guilty conscious man will not go to court because there he will have to give proof,” he said.