New Delhi : True to form the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Congress played the old blame game to the hilt as the Rajya Sabha debated the Rs.3600 crore VVIP chopper deal involving the Italian company AgustaWestland. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, who was to lay the chronology of the scam on the floor of the House, was not permitted to do by the Congress, and in his reply to the debate charged the previous UPA government with all sorts of wrong doing in the deal.
“There was relentless push by the UPA to go in for the AgustaWestland choppers. At the time of trials, the helicopter was at the stage of development and parameters were changed to favour the company,” charged Parrikar.
The minister, who had to face frequent disruptions from the opposition benches, said that the verdict of the Italian court that bribes had been paid to facilitate the deal had sullied the country’s image. ‘‘But now that the former Defence Minister A K Antony has accepted that this is a clear case of corruption, the nation wants to know the truth: who all benefited from graft,” he said.
At the end of his reply, the Congress demanded that there should be a Supreme Court monitored probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into this scam, and walked out in protest after this demand was rejected by the union minister for parliamentary affairs M Venkaiah Naidu.
During the course of his reply, Parrikar also said that though the CBI had registered a case on March 12, 2013, it did not bother to forward a copy of the FIR to ED for nine months, and later the ED did not act on the FIR till July 2014.”It appears an invisible hand was guiding action or inaction of the CBI and the ED,” the minister added.
Parrikar added that the CBI has already covered a lot of ground and is currently trying to unravel where the bribe money went. The inquiry now would focus on the roles of those named in the judgment of the Italian court. “The government will leave no stone unturned in bringing to justice those involved in the scam,” he added.
Antony’s counter attack: Under attack from the BJP, the Congress fielded former Defence Minister A K Antony among others to launch the counter-attack. Antony, under whose watch the scam took place, said that the government of the day did not lose any time in acting against the company when the controversy surfaced.
“Now that corruption is proved after the order of the Italian court, do not politicise this issue or you will have to repent. Do not include this company in your Make in India project,” he said.
Pointing out that defence procurement creates a lot of controversy and asserting that a government cannot appreciate a previous government, Antony added that even then he would like to state that the UPA government sincerely had zero tolerance for corruption in defence. ‘‘Do not threaten us. Do not blackmail us. Investigate the case thoroughly and punish the bribe givers and the bribe takers, whoever they may be,” he said.
The former defence minister added that when the controversy had erupted he had shown his readiness to go in for a probe by the joint parliamentary committee. “Normally, the opposition demands a JPC probe, but I was willing for it. But the opposition did not agree,” he added.
The debate was initiated by BJP member Bhupinder Yadav who charged that a convenient backdoor entry was created to let Agusta in and whoever is responsible must be punished.
Participating in the debate, Congress MP Abhishek Manu said that no one is arguing that everything is hunky dory and, obviously, there is wrongdoing. But the government here is trying to foist corruption charges against those not involved. “In February 2014, the UPA started the process of banning. The government that came to power issued an order to temporary ban the company in July. Then the government okayed exchanges with other umbrella companies and allowed dealing with the banned Italian company through third parties,” he charged.
