With Defence Minister AK Antony confirming on Monday that corruption had indeed taken place in the Rs3,700-crore VVIP helicopter deal with AgustaWestland, the Government may have few options but to blacklist the Italian company and cancel the contract. “I do feel somebody has taken money,” Antony told reporters in Kochi.
The Minister’s admission clearly means the Italian company violated the integrity pact, which paves the way for the cancellation of the contract and blacklisting of the firm.
In a report in its Monday edition, The Pioneer quoted a Defence Ministry official as saying that more credible evidence will be required to act against the Italian firm, and action cannot be “impulsive or intuitive.”
However, Antony said, he would stand by the commitment he made to Parliament that no mercy would be shown to anybody. “The investigation has entered a crucial phase. We will surely take action, however powerful they may be,” Antony said on the sidelines of a programme at the Southern Naval Command headquarters in Kochi. Stating that the CBI was pursuing the matter vigorously, Antony said everything would become clear after some time.
“Please wait for some more time. Have no doubt that strict action will be taken against those involved,” he said, adding that the Defence Ministry was in the final stages of the preparation of a new procurement policy. Antony said that the new policy for procurement would pursue indigenisation very, very aggressively.
Asked about the proposal to raise the FDI limit in the Defence sector, he said: “At the moment, we are not for any hasty decision.”
Critics and observers, however, refused to attach much weight to Antony’s confirmation by saying that the Defence Minister was not making any new disclosure. They said the whole country knew that there had been corruption in the deal and that influential people could have been behind it.
The point now was to identify them and act against them, they argued. The Italian investigators had already indicated long back that there had been corruption in the deal and that Finmeccanica had paid bribes to the tune of Rs360 crore to win the Rs3,700-crore deal for the acquisition of 12 VVIP helicopters, for which a contract was signed back in 2010.
Meanwhile, the BJP on Monday hit out at the Government for not acting swiftly to prosecute all those who received the kickbacks and slammed its failure to identify the bribe-takers.
BJP spokesperson Balbir Punj pointed out that none of the culprits have been brought to book so far. He said that the Government is making vague statements about taking action but doing little in this regard.
The CBI has registered a case against 11 people including retired Air Chief Marshal SP Tyagi for alleged cheating, corruption and criminal conspiracy. It had also carried out searches in at least 14 locations including his home.
Antony’s confirmation of corruption in the copter deal has come at a time when the CBI had received several more documents of critical importance from Italy and the Defence Ministry. It is said that the agency had shared these documents with the Enforcement Directorate.
According to the agency, a part of the Rs 360-crore bribe in the deal could have been routed to people in India through Mauritius and Tunisia. The first information report of the CBI had mentioned names of some cousins of the former Air Chief and two middlemen from Europe among others.