Yeddyurappa denies paying crores to BJP leaders

Bengaluru: Terming The Caravan magazine report that he paid crores of rupees to BJP national leaders a plant in the media by the Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) Karnataka unit President B.S. Yeddyurappa on Friday refuted the charges.

"Congress leaders have planted this story in the media to gain political mileage and launch a malicious campaign ahead of the coming (general) elections," an unfazed Yeddyurappa said in a statement.

As per the report published on Thursday, The Caravan accessed copies of diary entries in the handwriting of Yeddyurappa that note payoffs amounting to over Rs 1,800 crore were made to prominent BJP leaders such as Arun Jaitley, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari and party stalwarts L.K. Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi among others.

"The charge about the alleged payment of crores of rupees has already been probed by the Income Tax Department officials who found that the documents (dairy entries) were fake and the signatures were forged," said Yeddyurappa.

Yeddyurappa was the BJP's first Chief Minister in Karnataka who held office from May 2008 to July 2011.

The alleged payouts were recorded in Kannada by Yeddyurappa in a Karnataka Assembly legislator's 2009 diary, the report said.