How much money has been spent on Sonia Gandhi’s foreign tours? Narendra Modi quoted a figure of 1,880 crore rupees from Gujarati newspaper Jaihind dt. 12/7/2012. RTI activist Ramesh Verma had filed an application in 2010 and there was no reply. Congress has attacked Modi but no reply on how much was spent and why the delay in reply.
Someone said the figure of 1,880 crore rupees is absurd, it is several times the figure of space travel of Virgin Atlantic. Absurd things happen in India. Commonwealth Games were supposed to cost few hundred crores rupees. It went up to 1,02,000 crores.
Sonia Gandhi’s travel includes people who accompany her; her son, daughter, son-in-law, grandchildren and security guards. Sometimes she has led delegations to other countries. Once she went to Russia. If the planes were chartered, expenses would have been more. In what capacity did Sonia Gandhi spend public money? As an MP? As chairperson of UPA? As chairperson of NAC? When public money is spent people have a right to know how it is spent.
There may be something embarrassing about expenses. Questions may be raised about expenses on family members. That may be the reason why government does not want to reply to RTI question and Congress is unwilling to face the question.
CIC said government did not spend money on Sonia Gandhi’s medical expenses in August-September 2011. Nothing was said about travel expenses.