OUR BUREAU New Delhi
Summoned by the Central Bureau of Investigation, on Tuesday, for questioning in the Tatra truck, defence PSU BEML ( Bharat Earth Movers Limited) Chairman and Managing Director, V R S Natarajan, will have to exp
lain the contract renewed with the UK- based Tatra Sipox in 2003 despite the Comptroller and Auditor General ( CAG) pointing out serious procurement lapses in 2000.
He may wriggle out of the first deal struck by BEML in 1997 with the British intermediary of Czech company Tatra a. s. that the CBI is probing since he was not there with the company at that point of time, but he can not escape from explaining the deal renewed in 2003 when he headed it.
The CBI is probing a case handed over to it late last month on BEML buying the Tatra trucks from Tatra Sipox which is an intermediary firm and not an original equipment manufacturer ( OEM) in violation of the defence procurement rules mandating acquisitions only from the OEMs.
Sources said, Natarajan will also be grilled about some 500 trucks lying unused for want of spare parts as they cost Rs 40,000 crores to the exchequer. He has to also answer questions on the payment made fro 3,000 completely knocked down ( CKD) kits for the assembly of the trucks that have piled up as unnecessary inventory because the delivery came without the necessary gearboxes.
Though he had boasted during a defence expo here that BEML has indigenised 60 per cent of the parts going into the manufacture of the Tatra trucks, he will be put to task to explain why the import of almost entire CKD kits going into the manufacture of the trucks. He will be asked to identify the indigenised components fitted in the truck and their percentage.
Yet another tricky question on which Tatra- Vectra chairman Ravi Rishi has been grilled thrice in store for Natarajan is the way the General Staff Qualitative Requirement was downgraded to suit Tatra Sipox to supply the trucks for the Indian Army. About 5000 trucks have been supplied to the Army since Tatra Sipox came into picture.
Meanwhile, the Centre of Indian Trade Unions ( CITU) secretary Dipankar Mukherjee, a former MP, on Monday wrote to Defence Minister A K Antony to suspend Natarajan and order an independent alt39 techno- administrativealt39 probe into his false claims of indigenisation of Tatra trucks by BEML.
