The Defence Ministry has withdrawn permission to Finmeccannica, the parent company of AgustaWestland, to take part in the forthcoming five-day international defence exhibition DefExpo starting here from February 6. This comes a month after the Ministry cancelled the Rs 3,600 crore VVIP helicopter deal with Agusta for allegedly violating integrity pact.
Finmeccanica had booked space and paid participating fees for its group companies at the exhibition but their participation is now being cancelled, officials said.
The ministry took this step to avoid any embarrassment as questions would have come up as to how the Italian conglomerate was allowed to take part in the event even as one of its firms Agusta was facing charges of paying bribe to bag the VVIP helicopter deal, sources said.
The defence ministry has a policy that firms having corruption cases pending against them or they are blacklisted would not allowed to take part in the exhibition where more than 450 companies from India and abroad are expected to take part, officials said. They also said the Government will return the money taken from Finmeccanica for booking space adding the Defence Ministry has a list of 12 companies which are blacklisted and not allowed to take part in the event.
At the last edition of DefExpo, sister concern of one of the blacklisted Swiss firms had put up its stall at the show causing embarrassment to the Defence Ministry.
However, the Defence Ministry has not yet blacklisted the company or any of its group companies and says that it will take a decision in this regard after consulting the law Ministry and the CBI.