The Congress got an issue to beat the Opposition as a retired auditor, R.P. Singh, alleged that certain officials of the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Public Accounts Committee Chairman Murli Manohar Joshi colluded to prepare the CAG’s and PAC’s reports on the 2G scam.
Urging the CAG and Joshi to come clean on the allegations, the Congress maintained that the party’s stand that the loss figures on the CAG scam were wrong has been vindicated.
Given the retired auditor’s statements, Congress President Sonia Gandhi said the Bharatiya Janata Party stands exposed. The Congress members in the PAC had alleged a year ago that the PAC’s secretariat had no role in writing the report on 2G. They had rejected the report, which is yet to be tabled in Parliament.
Baseless, says Joshi
Joshi, however, said all the allegations were baseless. Joshi said Singh did not prove any of his allegations before the PAC. Joshi said Congress is making all efforts to cover up massive scams and is indulging in defaming Constitutional institutions.
The PAC sources indicated that they had discussed the issue earlier. An Opposition member in the panel said Singh is suffering from “selective amnesia.”
“It was Singh who made the first presentation to the PAC on the CAG report. He had no objections to the loss figures at that time,” BJD MP Bhartruhari Mahtab said.
Mahtab said Singh knows well that his loss figures were turned down by the Finance Ministry itself.
He urged Speaker Meira Kumar to intervene in the issue and protect the prestige of both the CAG and the PAC.
“PAC consults CAG officials in drafting its report. There is nothing wrong in it. But to say that the PAC chairman has influenced in writing a CAG report is condemnable,” he added.