{"id":300045,"date":"2018-07-06T08:52:04","date_gmt":"2018-07-06T08:52:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=300045"},"modified":"2018-07-06T08:52:04","modified_gmt":"2018-07-06T08:52:04","slug":"congress-alleges-multi-crore-bitcoin-scam-in-gujarat-seeks-judicial-probe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/congress-alleges-multi-crore-bitcoin-scam-in-gujarat-seeks-judicial-probe\/","title":{"rendered":"Congress alleges multi crore &#8216;Bitcoin Scam&#8217; in Gujarat, Seeks judicial probe"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-300046 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/b-scam-300x266.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"266\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/07\/b-scam-300x266.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/07\/b-scam-474x420.jpg 474w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/07\/b-scam.jpg 529w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>The Congress Party on July 5 has demanded a Supreme Court-monitored judicial probe into the alleged multi-crore (more than Rs. 5,000 crore) &#8220;bitcoin scam&#8221; that has surfaced in Gujarat with suspected involvement of BJP leaders for converting black money through Bitcoin transactions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">While addressing a press conference, Congress spokesperson Shaktisinh Gohil said, &#8220;A new mega bitcoin scam has been unraveled in Gujarat. The finger of suspicion of this massive scam of illegal cryptocurrency directly points to several top Bharatiya Janata Party leaders and a mastermind &#8212; an absconding BJP leader and former MLA Nalin Kotadiya.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Congress alleged that Bitcoin (digital currency) is used for illegal hawala transactions, kidnappings post-demonetisation and the scam came to view following the abduction of Surat-based builder Sailesh Bhatt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">While terming Congress allegations &#8216;laughable&#8217; BJP spokesperson Anil Baluni said: &#8220;nothing can be more unfortunate as it is the state police which has cracked the case and acted against several persons.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">&#8220;The dirty tricks department of the Congress is at work to spread confusion and lies. It is blaming the police who have uncovered the case. I wonder if the Congress is trying to help somebody in this case as part of a conspiracy,&#8221; Baluni said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">The scam began with a complaint made to Gujarat&#8217;s Minister of State for Home, by a Surat-based builder Sailesh Bhatt against Gujarat&#8217;s Amreli District police of alleged extortion of &#8220;200 bitcoins (Rs. 10 crore) and demanding Rs. 32 crore in cash. Later probe agencies found Amreli District police involvement in extortion and action was taken against several officials.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Congress Party on July 5 has demanded a Supreme Court-monitored judicial probe into the alleged multi-crore (more than Rs. 5,000 crore) &#8220;bitcoin scam&#8221; that has surfaced in Gujarat with suspected involvement of BJP leaders for converting black money through Bitcoin transactions. While addressing a press conference, Congress spokesperson Shaktisinh Gohil said, &#8220;A new mega [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":300046,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2838,1801,2014,2026],"tags":[3415,453,236,593,3416,134],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300045"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300045"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":300047,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300045\/revisions\/300047"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/300046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}