New Delhi: P Chidambaram has allegedly told Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that a note questioning his actions during India's telecom scam is part of an orchestrated campaign within the government against him.
During a 20-minute call from Frankfurt where he made an overnight halt on his way to New York, the Prime Minister reportedly assured Mr Chidambaram of his support. The Prime Minister is believed to have counselled Mr Chidambaram "to be patient" till he returns home from New York on September 27, said PTI.
In a statement issued this evening, Mr Chidambaram said he had spoken to both the Prime Minister and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on the matter. "As reported in the media, the Prime Minister called me last night from Frankfurt and spoke to me. The Finance Minister called me from Washington and spoke to me. I have assured the Prime Minister that I shall not make any public statement on the subject until he returns to India."
The note in question was sent by Pranab Mukherjee's ministry in March this year to Dr Manmohan Singh's office. It suggests that Mr Chidambaram could have been more proactive as Finance Minister in 2007, when India's greatest scam was unleashed in 2008 by A Raja, who was then Telecom Minister.
Mr Chidambaram explained the decisions he took when he was Finance Minister and Mr Raja was in the process of distributing mobile network licenses and second-generation (2G) frequency. Dr Manmohan Singh has also reportedly been in frequent touch with Mr Mukherjee since the controversial note was presented in the Supreme Court yesterday, during a hearing on the investigations into the telecom scam.
The controversial note has laid bare a bitter rivalry between two of the government's most senior ministers. On record, a Congress spokesperson said the rift exists only in the media's imagination. But sources say that Mr Chidambaram, during his phone call to the PM last night, said there was a campaign within the government to malign him.
"Mr Chidambaram should be either dismissed...or he should resign," said the BJP's Murli Manohar Joshi. "The note makes it clear that he played a role in this scam. The CBI must take up a case against him." Mr Joshi's party colleague Arun Jaitley said the "government was living in denial."
The note that has authored the controversy, was sent in March this year to the Prime Minister's Office. It was presented yesterday in the Supreme Court, which is monitoring the investigations into the telecom 2G scam. The 14-page document states that it was "seen by" Mr Mukherjee, establishing that the Finance Minister endorsed its findings. They include stressing that Mr Chidambaram could have tried much harder to force Mr Raja to auction valuable spectrum, instead of bundling it with licenses that were under-valued for companies who Mr Raja favoured.
Law Minister Salman Khurshid today dismissed the note from the Finance Ministry as a paper that "comes from a junior official in the (Finance) ministry...it's not a paper that is being sent either by a senior functionary or a minister," he said. "Some inferences that are sought to be drawn in that brief are certainly not acceptable."
Mr Mukherjee who is currently in New York refused to comment on the note other than to attribute its excavation to the Right to Information (RTI) Act, which, he said, has helped India combat corruption. "In fact today a sensational news item has come and it is through the exercise of the RTI. A note was sent by Minister of Finance to Prime Minister. Somebody demanded through the use of RTI to have the copy of that note from the Prime Minister's Secretariat and... fact of the matter is somebody has produced that as a piece of evidence in a particular case," the Finance Minister said.
Mr Chidambaram, who is currently touring Sikkim to assess the rescue and relief efforts being led largely by the Army after Sunday's whopping earthquake, refused to discuss the note against him.
The Opposition has predictably embraced the controversial letter While the Opposition has repeatedly accused Mr Chidambaram and the Prime Minister of allowing Mr Raja to swindle uninterrupted, the fact that his own government has now faulted Mr Chidambaram allows for a more incisive attack. The BJP says Mr Chidambaram must resign. "The first thing the Prime Minister should do is to order a CBI investigation into the role of the then Finance Minister, and the present Home Minister, Mr Chidambaram, in the entire 2G spectrum scandal," said the BJP's Ravishankar Prasad.
The telecom scam rests on how Mr Raja, now in jail, chose to award mobile network licences and accompanying second-generation or 2G frequency in 2008. Among the charges against him is that he refused to auction the spectrum, opting instead to give licences on a first-come-first-serve basis to ineligible companies. The lack of an auction, some experts say, has cost the government thousands of crores.
The note from Mr Mukherjee's team states that Mr Raja could have been coerced to auction spectrum if the Ministry of Finance, headed by Mr Chidambaram had "stuck to its stand." The document also suggests that even after the licenses were allocated in January 2008 at a cost of Rs. 1600 crore each to companies, the guidelines allowed the government four months to cancel the deals - an exit route that the Finance Ministry could have asked the Department of Telecom to use.
The note against Mr Chidambaram was prepared by the Deputy Director, Economic Affairs on March 25, 2011. It was produced in court on Wednesday by Subramanian Swamy, who is one of the main petitioners in the case on the telecom scam that is being heard by the Supreme Court. Mr Swamy has been demanding that Mr Chidambaram be charged in the CBI's case.
Mr Raja, who is now in jail, has repeatedly said that he had kept both the Prime Minister and Mr Chidambaram in the loop about his decisions on 2G spectrum. Mr Chidambaram has maintained that he tried to persuade Mr Raja on multiple occasions to opt for an auction. On January 15, five days after Mr Raja signed off on the licenses Mr Chidambaram also wrote to the PM opposing the trade of spectrum.
The government has repeatedly said that it was not the policy followed by Mr Raja but his twisted implementation to benefit certain companies that led to the scam. Different ministers have argued that they implemented the telecom policies introduced by the NDA regime which was in power at the centre till 2004.
In a controversial report submitted recently, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India or TRAI also said that it did not recommend that 2G airwaves be auctioned.
The distrust between Mr Mukherjee and Mr Chidambaram was also on public display a few months ago when it emerged that the Finance Minister had written to the PM, warning him of a possible security breach in the Finance Ministry.
In September last year, Mr Mukherjee said that offices in his ministry may have been bugged and that "planted adhesives" had been found.
The fact that Mr Mukherjee did not report the matter to the Home Minister was used by the Opposition as an illustration of the "trust deficit" between senior members of the government. Mr Mukherjee later said that the adhesives were most likely chewing gum, and that no evidence of espionage had emerged.
During a 20-minute call from Frankfurt where he made an overnight halt on his way to New York, the Prime Minister reportedly assured Mr Chidambaram of his support. The Prime Minister is believed to have counselled Mr Chidambaram "to be patient" till he returns home from New York on September 27, said PTI.
In a statement issued this evening, Mr Chidambaram said he had spoken to both the Prime Minister and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on the matter. "As reported in the media, the Prime Minister called me last night from Frankfurt and spoke to me. The Finance Minister called me from Washington and spoke to me. I have assured the Prime Minister that I shall not make any public statement on the subject until he returns to India."
The note in question was sent by Pranab Mukherjee's ministry in March this year to Dr Manmohan Singh's office. It suggests that Mr Chidambaram could have been more proactive as Finance Minister in 2007, when India's greatest scam was unleashed in 2008 by A Raja, who was then Telecom Minister.
Mr Chidambaram explained the decisions he took when he was Finance Minister and Mr Raja was in the process of distributing mobile network licenses and second-generation (2G) frequency. Dr Manmohan Singh has also reportedly been in frequent touch with Mr Mukherjee since the controversial note was presented in the Supreme Court yesterday, during a hearing on the investigations into the telecom scam.
The controversial note has laid bare a bitter rivalry between two of the government's most senior ministers. On record, a Congress spokesperson said the rift exists only in the media's imagination. But sources say that Mr Chidambaram, during his phone call to the PM last night, said there was a campaign within the government to malign him.
"Mr Chidambaram should be either dismissed...or he should resign," said the BJP's Murli Manohar Joshi. "The note makes it clear that he played a role in this scam. The CBI must take up a case against him." Mr Joshi's party colleague Arun Jaitley said the "government was living in denial."
The note that has authored the controversy, was sent in March this year to the Prime Minister's Office. It was presented yesterday in the Supreme Court, which is monitoring the investigations into the telecom 2G scam. The 14-page document states that it was "seen by" Mr Mukherjee, establishing that the Finance Minister endorsed its findings. They include stressing that Mr Chidambaram could have tried much harder to force Mr Raja to auction valuable spectrum, instead of bundling it with licenses that were under-valued for companies who Mr Raja favoured.
Law Minister Salman Khurshid today dismissed the note from the Finance Ministry as a paper that "comes from a junior official in the (Finance) ministry...it's not a paper that is being sent either by a senior functionary or a minister," he said. "Some inferences that are sought to be drawn in that brief are certainly not acceptable."
Mr Mukherjee who is currently in New York refused to comment on the note other than to attribute its excavation to the Right to Information (RTI) Act, which, he said, has helped India combat corruption. "In fact today a sensational news item has come and it is through the exercise of the RTI. A note was sent by Minister of Finance to Prime Minister. Somebody demanded through the use of RTI to have the copy of that note from the Prime Minister's Secretariat and... fact of the matter is somebody has produced that as a piece of evidence in a particular case," the Finance Minister said.
Mr Chidambaram, who is currently touring Sikkim to assess the rescue and relief efforts being led largely by the Army after Sunday's whopping earthquake, refused to discuss the note against him.
The Opposition has predictably embraced the controversial letter While the Opposition has repeatedly accused Mr Chidambaram and the Prime Minister of allowing Mr Raja to swindle uninterrupted, the fact that his own government has now faulted Mr Chidambaram allows for a more incisive attack. The BJP says Mr Chidambaram must resign. "The first thing the Prime Minister should do is to order a CBI investigation into the role of the then Finance Minister, and the present Home Minister, Mr Chidambaram, in the entire 2G spectrum scandal," said the BJP's Ravishankar Prasad.
The telecom scam rests on how Mr Raja, now in jail, chose to award mobile network licences and accompanying second-generation or 2G frequency in 2008. Among the charges against him is that he refused to auction the spectrum, opting instead to give licences on a first-come-first-serve basis to ineligible companies. The lack of an auction, some experts say, has cost the government thousands of crores.
The note from Mr Mukherjee's team states that Mr Raja could have been coerced to auction spectrum if the Ministry of Finance, headed by Mr Chidambaram had "stuck to its stand." The document also suggests that even after the licenses were allocated in January 2008 at a cost of Rs. 1600 crore each to companies, the guidelines allowed the government four months to cancel the deals - an exit route that the Finance Ministry could have asked the Department of Telecom to use.
The note against Mr Chidambaram was prepared by the Deputy Director, Economic Affairs on March 25, 2011. It was produced in court on Wednesday by Subramanian Swamy, who is one of the main petitioners in the case on the telecom scam that is being heard by the Supreme Court. Mr Swamy has been demanding that Mr Chidambaram be charged in the CBI's case.
Mr Raja, who is now in jail, has repeatedly said that he had kept both the Prime Minister and Mr Chidambaram in the loop about his decisions on 2G spectrum. Mr Chidambaram has maintained that he tried to persuade Mr Raja on multiple occasions to opt for an auction. On January 15, five days after Mr Raja signed off on the licenses Mr Chidambaram also wrote to the PM opposing the trade of spectrum.
The government has repeatedly said that it was not the policy followed by Mr Raja but his twisted implementation to benefit certain companies that led to the scam. Different ministers have argued that they implemented the telecom policies introduced by the NDA regime which was in power at the centre till 2004.
In a controversial report submitted recently, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India or TRAI also said that it did not recommend that 2G airwaves be auctioned.
The distrust between Mr Mukherjee and Mr Chidambaram was also on public display a few months ago when it emerged that the Finance Minister had written to the PM, warning him of a possible security breach in the Finance Ministry.
In September last year, Mr Mukherjee said that offices in his ministry may have been bugged and that "planted adhesives" had been found.
The fact that Mr Mukherjee did not report the matter to the Home Minister was used by the Opposition as an illustration of the "trust deficit" between senior members of the government. Mr Mukherjee later said that the adhesives were most likely chewing gum, and that no evidence of espionage had emerged.
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