The bomb dropped last Tuesday. But it took some time for everyone to realise the impact of the explosion. It has shaken the Indian government, and it has destroyed the secret world of arms agents in Europe. It’s being called another Bofors, a reference to a bribery scandal that rocked the Rajiv Gandhi government in the late 1980. That scam had an Italian connection. This one too has links with Italy.
Last Tuesday, a mega defence scam surfacedas the Italian Government arrested thehead of a major defence and aerospace groupover allegations that the company paid a heftybribe to bag the Rs3,700 crore Westland helicoptersupply deal from India. The chargeshave been reported in the Indian media overthe last 11 months and the matter was alsoraised in Parliament. But the Governmentwoke up only after the Italian authorities arrestedFinmeccanica chief Giusppe Orsi inMilan last Tuesday.
Pushed into action, DefenceMinister AK Antony ordered a CentralBureau of Investigation probe into the scandal.As per the deal, AgustaWestland (UK),a subsidiary of Finmeccanica, was to supply12 VVIP helicopters to India. Three of thesehelicopters arrived in December last year.The kickback is suspected to be to the tune ofRs350 crore.The Indian Defence Ministry did not takeany action when reports about the allegationscame out regularly in the media in the last fewmonths and took the plea that a formal probewas not possible as the Italian and UK Governmentswere not sharing the details of the investigations.
The Indian Government is yetto get any formal report from Italy, but wasforced to order a probe into the allegationswhen Orsi was arrested.Now, it’s turning into a big political showdown.Describing the Italian chopper deal asone having the “makings of a second Boforsscam”, BJP has asked the government as tohow long it will “protect” bribe-takers andsaid it will raise the issue strongly during theBudget Session of Parliament. The main oppositionalso demanded that the helicopterdeal should be reviewed and the supply of theremaining nine choppers be stopped till alldoubts are cleared.
“It is a Bofors-like case. When bribe-giverhas been caught, why can’t the bribe-takerbe identified. Till when will the Indian governmentsave the bribe-takers. BJP will raise theissue seriously in the Budget Session of Parliamentand seek a reply from the government toidentify who the bribe-takers are and who areprotecting them,” Leader of Opposition in theRajya Sabha Arun Jaitley told reporters.His colleague and party spokespersonRavi Shankar Prasad said, “This deal raisesa serious question. There was one gentlemanOttavio Quattrochhi from Italy who was involvedin the Bofors scam.
Several attemptswere made to protect him. This helicoptercompany is also from Italy. Was this a factorin no probe being done in the matter for thepast one year?”Though BJP did not spell out its strategy on the issue, Prasad said the partywill raise this matter strongly inside and outsideParliament. “I see the making of a secondBofors in this scam. The government has notbeen able to explain why it was silent for oneyear on this issue despite the details beingavailable in the public domain,” Prasad said.
“This a very serious matter…Immediate action in this matter is required,” he said. The main opposition party also accused Antony of giving an incorrect statement in Parliament about the VVIP chopper deal and saidhe should clarify it in the House. In reply toa question from BJP MP Prakash Javadekar,Antony had said in Parliament that upon his ministry’s request, the External Affairs Ministry has taken up the matter with the Italian and UK governments to get further details.Even as investigations are going on theo pposition parties are trying to revive the Bofors controversy, which weakens the Congress government led by Rajiv Gandhi, the late husband of the Congress president Sonia Gandhi,some politicians are already making allegations against the Gandhi family.
On Monday,Janata Party president Subramanian Swamyalleged that the UPA Government doesn’t want the truth behind the alleged corruptionin AgustaWestland deal to come out because Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s family is involved in the deal. “The scam is not surprising for me. Another chopper was selected in the beginning of the deal, but citing some technicalities,they changed the company. It was only for the commission, and the Nehru-Gandhi family has acquired the most part of the commission.About half of the total money has gone to Sonia’s two sisters in Italy,” said Swamy. Reacting to the Italian court’s refusal for sharing information and documents, Swamy said: “Naturally the court will not share the information like this. The CBI should have to first gone to a court here and obtained a letter seeking information or documents. The Italian court will be bound to share information after that letter. But, the government is not serious,they are investigating in the matter just for the sake of investigation.”
But the CBI has engaged a lawyer in Italy to represent India’s case with the Italian government and the local courts to find out the role of Indians in the alleged kickbacks in the helicopter deal. Official sources said that the assistance of a lawyer was taken to help understand the Italian law and expedite getting documents from the helicopter company. The lawyer, if necessary, would be approaching the court inItaly for procurement of documents, they said.The CBI is acting now but the government hasn’t done anything about these allegations in the past.
Taking note of media reports,BJP leader Prakash Javadekar raised the issuein the Rajya Sabha on December 12 last yearand Antony replied “on the request of the Defence Ministry, the External Affairs Ministryhas taken up the matter with the Governmentsof Italy and UK to get further detailsin this regard. However, in the absence of any specific information, the Government has notstarted any formal probe in this regard by Indian agencies.”The BJP leader in a letter to Antony on December 14 last said the Italian investigators were probing allegations that Augusta Westland paid a commission of Rs 350 crore to Switzerland based consultant Guido Ralph Haschke to facilitate the deal in India.
Javadekar also said the names of several Indians have already surfaced in the Preliminary Enquiry(PE) report that had been filed by Italian investigators in a court in Naples and urged Antony to initiate a suo moto time-boundprobe in this regard as soon as possible.Javadekar on Tuesday said the BJP hadraised the question of financial irregularities in the VVIP helicopter deal for the past oneyear and insisted that the Congress-led UPAGovernment should give an explanation aboutthe reported anomalies.“Action has been taken in Italy on theVVIP helicopter scam. The CEO of the companyhas been arrested.
But no action hasbeen taken here. The country, which wouldhave benefited from the deal, has taken actionwhile the country which lost money has notdone anything,” Javadekar told reporters.This delay in action could have helpedhelp the bribe-takers. According to reportsfrom Rome, the alleged middleman in thedeal Guido Haschke had “cleaned up” all thedocuments from his computer related to theVVIP chopper deal. But to Haschke’s misfortunethe documents were retrieved from hiscomputer hard drive along with other papershe had hidden at his mother’s home.
Accordingto reports in the Italian media, the investigatorstermed the information found in hiscomputer drives as a “Pandora’s box” wherehe has noted details of his appointments, hismeetings with Indian intermediaries, in Italyand Lugano and several international transactionsincluding that of Finmeccanica.Now, all eyes are on CBI, which hashanded over a letter from the Defence Ministryseeking a probe by it in the case which hastriggered a storm in the country. But it all dependson how serious is CBI in finding truth inthis case. In the past 30 years, the CBI has notcracked a single corruption case. Will it crackthis one? It’s anybody’s guess.
source: theindianeye
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