Cong slams the govt for attempts to help friendly “crony capitalists and cries foul at the Telecom Ministry”s bid to dilute the loss figures put forth by the CAG by putting own empanelled CAs to re-evaluate these figures
New Delhi : Mounting a fresh attack on Modi Sarkar on the issue of corruption, the Congress has charged that the Central government is involved in a massive Rs 45,000 crore telecom scam.
“Let us not forget that the BJP had painted us black on the notional loss” pointed out by the CAG in the allocation of spectrum. But this is not a case of notional loss. This is very much a real loss that has been pointed by the same CAG and names six companies that stand to gain by the government”s connivance in this corruption,” said Congress spoke-sperson Randeep Surjewala. He named the companies as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea, Reliance, Tata and Aircel – all telecom majors.
At a media briefing, Surjewala narrated the chain of events that have led to the surfacing of this scam. He said that the private telecom companies were expected to share a portion of their revenue with the government, but there was no way of assessing the accuracy of the contribution as their accounts were beyond the purview of government audit. “When the UPA government wanted that their accounts should be audited by the CAG in accordance with the constitution, these companies took recourse to legal battles. Finally, in April 2014, the Supreme Court after amalgamating all the cases, ruled that the CAG could conduct the audit, as the issue related to the contribution to the consolidated fund of India,” he said.
Surjewala said the CAG”s audit report was tabled in parliament in March 2016, and it had directed the government to recover Rs 12,500 crore as this additional sum was due on the revenues that had not been reported by the telecom companies.” But instead of issuing recovery notices the government referred the matter to a set of empanelled Chartered Accountants with the Ministry of Telecom. This brazen act of defying the recommendations of a constitutional authority was aimed at providing relief to the industrialist friends of the government,” said Surjewala while observing that this fits into the description of the Modi government as ”suit boot ki Sarkar.”
Surjewala said the outstanding sum of Rs 12,500 crore relates to the four year period from 2006 to 2010, and if the growth in the telecom sector – its subscriber base, its rates and the volume of business are taken into account then the ”sum easily crosses Rs 45,000 crore.”
The Congress spokesperson charged that neglecting the CAG report is a matter of habit with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “As chief minister of Gujarat, he ignored the findings in the successive CAG reports about the mounting losses in the state owned Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) and these have mounted to Rs 20,000 crore. Now he has ignored the findings of the CAG about this revenue loss,” he charged.
He did not agree with a questioner that then union telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had been eäsed out of this ministry due to this scam. “We all know the Prime Minister”s style of functioning. This is not an issue to be dealt by a minister, the accountability goes up to the Prime Minister,” he added.
