ND Tiwari refuses DNA test

Veteran Congress leader ND Tiwari on Wednesday refused to appear before the Delhi High Court to give blood samples for a DNA test to settle a paternity suit filed by one Rohit Shekhar.

Tiwari, in an application to the court, said he cannot be pressurized to give his samples.

He also requested the court joint registrar Deepak Garg to cut the cost of Rs 75,000 imposed on him for seeking to delete some paragraphs from Shekhar?s paternity suit.

“As he is a pension earner and has no other property in his name, he cannot give that amount,” Tiwari’s counsel told the court.

The court directed Tiwari to appear before it on July 7.

On May 10, the Delhi High Court asked Tiwari to give blood samples by June 1 for the DNA test.

Shekhar and his mother Ujjwala Sharma were also directed to be present at the court?s dispensary and give their respective blood samples for the DNA test.

The court said Tiwari, Shekhar and Ujjwala have to bear the cost for the DNA test.

The High Court had on December 23 ordered the former Andhra Pradesh governor to undergo a DNA test.

Shekhar had claimed that he was Tiwari’s son born to Congress activist Ujjwala and wanted a declaration to that effect.

Shekhar had claimed that Tiwari began neglecting him and his mother after 1995 and refused to meet him after becoming the Uttaranchal chief minister. He wanted a DNA test to confirm his biological father.

However, the 85-year-old Congressman maintained that he never had ?any relationship? with Ujjwala.

Tiwari’s five-decade-old political career came to a virtual end after a news channel in 2009 showed clippings of an elderly man purported to be Tiwari in bed with three young women. A few days later, Tiwari resigned as the Andhra Pradesh governor citing health grounds.