Goa Governor BV Wanchoo on Friday resigned hours after being questioned by the CBI in connection with the bribery scandal relating to purchase of VVIP helicopters from AgustaWestland.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED), meanwhile, slapped a money laundering case on former IAF chief SP Tyagi and others, accused in the VVIP chopper scam. The agency will probe the case to establish the proceeds of crime in the alleged kickbacks paid to procure the copters. The assets identified as proceeds of crime can be attached.
Wanchoo is a former chief of elite Special Protection Group. A 1976-batch IPS officer, Wanchoo’s resignation came a few days after former National Security Advisor MK Narayanan quit as Governor of West Bengal after being questioned by the CBI.
The ED had last week registered a case under Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) in the scam and decided to slap a criminal case to track the “illegal money” of the bribe, alleged to be over Rs 360 crore, transacted between the middlemen and other persons named by CBI in its FIR filed in March 2013.
As part of its ongoing probe into the allegations of bribery in the procurement of 12 VVIP helicopters, the CBI recorded Wanchoo’s statement as a “witness”. A CBI team from Delhi quizzed Wanchoo at Raj Bhavan in Panaji and recorded his statement into allegations of bribery in the Rs 3,600-crore VVIP chopper deal worth AgustaWestland.
Wanchoo’s examination was warranted as he had participated in the meeting in March 2005 as head of the elite SPG. The meeting decided to tweak the technical parameters of the copters to allegedly to suit the AgustaWestland.
The service ceiling (maximum height at which a helicopter can operate) was reduced from the original 6,000 metres to 4,500 metres. In its FIR, the CBI has alleged that reduction of the service ceiling allowed the UK-based firm to get into the fray as otherwise its choppers were not even qualified for submission of bids.
Apart from the changes in the operational height, the flight evaluation tests were also altered in a manner that enabled AgustaWestland to clinch the deal vis-a-vis its competitor Sikorsky, an American firm.The CBI had registered a case against former IAF chief S P Tyagi along with 13 others including his cousins and European middlemen in the case.
The allegation against the former Air chief was that he had reduced service ceiling of the helicopter so that AgustaWestland was included in the bids.Taking cognisance of the CBI FIR in the case, the ED has booked Tyagi, his family members, European middlemen Carlo Gerosa, Christian Michel and Guido Haschke and four companies — Italy-based Finmeccanica, UK-based AgustaWestland and Chandigarh-based IDS Infotech and Aeromatrix — in its criminal complaint filed under the provisions of the Prevention of Money laundering Act (PMlA). Thirteen individuals and entities have been named by ED in the case.
ED sources said the agency will soon initiate the process of recording of statements of the accused persons and may send letters Rogatory (lRs) or judicial requests to a few European countries, including Italy, seeking their cooperation.The VVIP chopper deal was scrapped by the UPA Government in January this year under the provisions of Integrity Pact and bank guarantees worth over Rs 2,400 crore deposited by AgustaWestland in banks in Italy and India were subsequently encashed.