The predictable scandal of the UPA govt

For over a week, newspapers have been publishing reports that the Swiss authorities rejected the request to disclose details of the accounts and transactions of Hassan Ali Khan because the Government of India had sent forged papers.

This has now been confirmed by the spokesman of the Ministry of Justice of the Swiss Government in his interview to CNN-IBN.

The Justice Ministry official has also revealed that this fact about the forgery had been communicated to the Indian Government in early 2007 itself. He has said that the Indian Government was requested to provide valid documents and to confirm that the case against Hassan Ali Khan is a criminal one.

The Indian Government sent some documents in March 2007, and even these were not the requisite ones.

Since then, the Indian Government has not got back to the Swiss Government at all on the matter – neither to show that the documents it had supplied were genuine and adequate nor to replace them with genuine documents and ones that are required under the law.

What can this indicate except that what was done was done by design?

Furthermore, it is shocking that the Government has suppressed these facts – what it had ostensibly done, and what the Swiss Government had communicated to it – from the Supreme Court in its affidavit-in-reply to the PIL that has been filed by concerned citizens. As is well known, suppression of facts from the court – and that too from the highest court of the country – is a grave offence on its own. The Government knows this as well, and yet has chosen to suppress them rather than let the Court, and, through it, the people get an opportunity to learn the truth.

That this Government, the Government that has let Ottavio Quattrochi take away the money that had been frozen on orders of the courts; this Government which then used the CBI to let the man off the hook completely; this Government in which corruption has reached levels that were unheard of till now; this Government which has been consistently soft on terror, that this Government should now have stooped so low as to help an operator like Hassan Ali Khan by sending forged documents to a foreign Government is entirely in character.

Based on what they have been told by officials of intelligence agencies as well as of the Enforcement Directorate, the media have reported that Hassan Ali Khan

•    Has been known to be connected to Dawood Ibrahim

•  Has been known to have been channeling very large amounts from unknown sources into the Indian stock market

•    Has had 8 to 9 billion dollars in the UBS and other banks of Switzerland

•    Has been responsible for hawala transactions of over Rs. 35,000 crore through Swiss banks.

That such a nefarious operator should be helped by this Government is entirely predictable – it is the Congress(I) Government of Karnataka which refused to permit the CBI to investigate the equally notorious Telgi, and later put obstacle after obstacle in its course.

Apart from the sorts of statements by which it tried to mislead the country when Mr. Advani raised the demand for getting India’s stolen wealth back, the way it has helped Hassan Ali Khan exposes its character, and the fact that as long as such a Government is in office, the country will never get its wealth back.

But what is at stake is not just the wealth that has been stolen from the country. In addition,

•    the country’s honour is at stake

•    and its security.

Once again, the country is being held up to ridicule – once again, the world is being shown how the Government of India will bend our laws and institutions to help the worst sorts of criminals and their associates, exactly as banana republics do.

Moreover, international bodies as well the National Security Advisor of this very Government have pointed out that black money, hawala operations as well as tax havens are being used by terrorists and agencies like the ISI for carrying out terrorist and anti-India operations.

The Asia Pacific Group, which has been studying money laundering and terrorist operations, pointed out in 2005 that India had not taken the requisite steps in this regard, that it had not even carried out the comprehensive threat assessment that was required.

The Government did nothing.

No less an authority than the National Security Advisor has been stressing publicly since early 2007 that stricter provisions need to be put in place to check money flows to and from tax havens, and to ensure that banking secrecy is brought to an end, as these channels are being used by terrorists and their sponsors.

The Government did nothing – actually, it did something: around exactly the time that the National Security Advisor was urging the foregoing, in February-March 2007, it sent forged documents to foreclose any possibility of facts being discovered about Hassan Ali Khan and his associates.

In June 2008, the Government-appointed Administrative Reforms Commission, headed by its very own, M. Veerappa Moily, drew attention to the urgent need to plug terrorist financing. In its 8th Report, the Commission listed the channels through which, and the guises under which terrorist organizations and their sponsors were sending money for their operations in India. In particular, it urged that the anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist operations needed to be merged. It made a series of detailed recommendations in this regard.

The Government did nothing.

That on even so grave a matter the state of affairs is exactly as it was is evident from the fact that in March 2009, the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report released by the US State Department again shows that, far from taking effective steps, India has not even brought its legal framework against money laundering and terrorism financing at par with the regime agreed to by the inter-governmental Financial Action Task Force. It urges the country to swiftly do so.

We urge the media to continue to pursue the facts.

We urge the people to see how the country’s development, its security, its honour are being jeopardized by this Government.

And how even the obvious steps will just not be taken till this Government remains in office.

BJP's Stand on Quottrocchi and The Killings of Sikhs in Pakistan by the Taliban

1.    Bharatiya Janata Party deplores the absurd logic of the PM Manmohan Singh that India would have been looked down by the world community if red corner notice against Quatrocchi was not removed. This is a futile attempt to defend the indefensible act of the CBI. This also proves that withdrawal of red corner notice against Quottrocchi is not a CBI decision but a political decision of the UPA government. Instead of proceeding with the investigations UPA government offered Quattrochi a parting gift.

BJP has one poser for the Prime Minister that he should explain why then world community will not look down India when it does not carry out the hanging of Parliament attacker Mohammad Afzal Guru, who is condemned by the Supreme Court?  UPA wants to save Afzal for vote bank politics and Quottrocchi for his connection with the first family of the Congress. Both these decisions have once again proved that "Congress Ka Hath Quottrocchi Aur Afzal Ke Saath".

2.    Bharatiya Janata Party expresses deep concern over the report of killings and fleeing of Hindus and Sikhs from Swath valley by Talibans. BJP demands that Government of India should take proactive steps to save people of Indian origin living in Pakistan. Government utterly failed to protect the people of Indian origin in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh and elsewhere. Efforts by the government so far have remained technical only and have not yielded any tangible results.

Bofors scam: Quattrocchi off CBI's wanted list

The Interpol has removed the red corner notice issued against Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi, who was being sought in India 

for criminal charges for acting as a conduit for bribes in the Rs 64-crore Bofors scandal. ( Watch ) 

This comes just three weeks before the Congress-led UPA government's term ends. 

The Italian businessman no longer figures in the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) list of wanted persons and the 12-year Interpol red corner notice against the lone surviving suspect in the Bofors payoff case has been withdrawn from the agency’s website after the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) appeal.

The CBI will formally inform the court of the same on April 30. "The case has been under trial in the courts since 1999. CBI has taken action on the basis of legal advice of the highest order. We will inform the competent court on the next date of hearing (April 30, 2009)," CBI spokesman Harsh Bahal said here today. 

The CBIs decision is based on the legal opinion sent by Attorney General Milon Banerjee to the government in which he describes the notice as "a continuing embarrassment." 

Banerjee writes: "The CBI is under an obligation to have the matters set right at the Interpol level as there is no basis on which the RCN can continue...I am of the firm opinion that immediate action should be taken to withdraw the Red Corner Notice". 

Quattrochi's counsel had already sought the removal of the notice in October 2008. 

Quattrocchi's role in Bofors scam, and his proximity to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi through his wife Sonia Gandhi, is thought to have contributed to the defeat of the Congress Party in the 1989 elections. 

Ten years later (1999), the CBI named Quattrocchi in a chargesheet as the conduit for the Bofors bribe and on he basis of a 1997 non-bailable warrant, the agency sought a red corner notice against him The case against him was strengthened in June 2003, when Interpol revealed two bank accounts, 5A5151516M and 5A5151516L, held by Quattrocchi and his wife Maria with the BSI AG bank, London, containing Euros 3 million and $1 million, a "curiously large savings for a salaried executive". 

In January 2006, these frozen bank accounts were unexpectedly released by country's law ministry, apparently without the consent of the CBI which had asked for them to be frozen. 

Reacting to the development, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi called the Bofors case ‘a dead horse that the BJP has been flogging.” 

“BJP has been unnecessarily dragging Rajiv Gandhi’s name,” Singhvi said. 

BJP senior leader L K Advani trained his guns on CBI for dropping the businessman’s name and demanded a probe into the agency's role during the last five years. 

"This is a serious decision. It is not a question of Quattrocchi alone but the entire role of the agency during the last five years which should be probed. It is a very serious issue. They have become the "dastak" or "handtool" in the hands of politicians," Advani, while campaigning in his constituency, said. 

Callous Congress, feckless PM

If we lesser mortals were to be found misleading someone intentionally, we would be accused of telling a lie. To be called a liar is as good as being told your integrity quotient is zero. Telling the truth, as we all know, may be difficult but is considered a virtue; telling a lie is sinful, a vice to which the feckless and the irresolute are given. But what about someone who holds high office and misleads the nation in the most casual (some would say sly) manner? Does vice become a virtue when your are the Prime Minister of India? I refer to Mr Manmohan Singh’s comment on Friday in response to a query on the shameful Jagdish Tytler-Sajjan Kumar episode. “I was not informed, not consulted, over the CBI’s clean chit to Jagdish Tytler,” he told members of the Indian Women’s Press Corps whom he hosted for tea.

In this age of lazy journalism it is unlikely anybody will bother to raise a doubt or two about the Prime Minister’s claim. But this needs to be done, if only to expose him for what he is, which is definitely far-removed from what he would like everybody to believe he is. So let’s check out the facts. The CBI, contrary to popular notion, does not report to the Ministry of Home Affairs; it reports to the quaintly named Department of Personnel and Training, otherwise known as ‘DoPT’, which is headed by a Minister of State. The DoPT is part of the portfolio of responsibilities held by the Prime Minister to whom the Minister of State in charge of that department reports. While routine administrative issues are directly dealt with by the Minister of State, he or she keeps the Prime Minister fully informed on sensitive issues, including high profile cases being handled by the CBI. In fact, files related to such cases are routed through the Prime Minister’s Office, which is known to have issued instructions to the CBI on certain occasions — recall the letter written by a senior PMO official, known for his proximity to 10 Janpath, directing the agency to deal with one of the accused in the Ayodhya case in a particular manner. In brief, it is an intimate relationship, never mind the Supreme Court’s directive that the CBI should function as an autonomous agency. It is highly unlikely, and that is putting it mildly, that the CBI would have sought closure of the cases against Tytler without discussing it with the DoPT, which in effect means the PMO. In other words, Mr Singh would have been aware of the CBI’s move.

Even if he were blissfully ignorant of it, surely Mr Singh reads newspapers and watches 24x7 news channels, at least those which don’t tire of extolling his ‘abilities’, such as they are. The CBI submitted its closure report to the trial court on April 2. The story was prominently published by every newspaper and found more than passing mention on prime time news. On April 7, when Jarnail Singh, a reporter with the Dainik Jagran, apparently upset over Mr P Chidambaram’s rude response to his questions on the Government giving Tytler and Kumar a clean chit despite the evidence — by way of affidavits, submissions and eyewitness accounts — of their role in the horrendous bloodletting of 1984 when 4,733 Sikhs were massacred after Mrs Indira Gandhi’s assassination, hurled one of his shoes at the Home Minister. It is only then that the Congress got into the act. Between April 2 and April 7, for full five days the Prime Minister did nothing, although he obviously knew about it, if not through the DoPT then from media reports.

For Mr Singh to now say “I was not informed, not consulted” is more than astounding. But there’s a pattern to his denying any knowledge about the actions of the CBI and pretending great surprise every time the Government has been caught on the wrong foot. When the CBI manipulated the de-freezing of two London bank accounts where Ottavio Quattrocchi is believed to have parked his share of the Bofors payola, thus helping the Italian wheeler-dealer who is a fugitive from Indian law to grab the money and run, similar lack of knowledge was proclaimed. Indeed, the Prime Minister has rarely been upfront; on the contrary, effortlessly and with great ease, he has excelled in slyly misleading the nation time and again, as he did most stunningly on the India-US civil nuclear cooperation agreement. 

In his memoirs, A Prattler’s Tale, economist Ashok Mitra is ruthlessly honest in his description of Mr Singh: “His timidity is the product of his civil servant’s mind, which many mistake as humility.” He also recounts an incident from his days as a member of the Rajya Sabha when Mr Singh was the Union Finance Minister. At a meeting of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee attached to the Ministry of Finance, Mr Mitra wanted the Government to supply copies of an RBI report listing the identities of individuals and corporates who owed more than a crore of rupees in unpaid bank loans adding up to more than Rs 50,000 crore. “The Finance Minister (Mr Singh) had a quick consultation with the Finance Secretary, who was sitting next to him, and agreed to place copies of the report before the members (of the committee)... Then the fun started. Days went by, then weeks, followed by a full month, but we did not receive copies of the report. I wrote to the Finance Minister but there was no reply from him. I sent him another letter... the silence was unbroken. At the next meeting of the committee, I hit the roof. Manmohan, however, was unfazed. He feigned surprise, ‘What, did I really make such a promise? I do not remember. Perhaps there was a misunderstanding’.” Mr Mitra has other stories to tell about our economist Prime Minister, but since he hasn’t committed them to paper, I shan’t either.

But Mr Singh’s proclivity to mislead others is not the only trait that raises discomfiting questions about India’s ‘accidental Prime Minister’. Nor should we needlessly cavil about his fake humility. What is relevant is his, to quote Mr Mitra, “lamb-like devotion” to the Nehru-Gandhi family, his “worshipful frame of mind”. It is this which prompts him to behave in the most craven manner, heaping treacly praise on the person who wields the authority of the office he holds, and which sets him apart from his senior colleagues like Mr Pranab Mukherjee. “Obviously the decision (to field Tytler and Kumar as candidates for the Lok Sabha election from Delhi constituencies) was reversed. It shows the Congress party’s sensitivity towards the Sikh community and for this you should compliment the Congress party,” he told members of the Indian Women’s Press Corps during his Friday’s interaction. Everybody knows that the decision was reversed by the Congress president. So the praise he solicits is not for the party but its president. As for ‘sensitivity towards the Sikh community’, had Mr Singh’s assertion been true, he would not have allowed the CBI to do something so reprehensible. But that would have required courage and integrity.