Money-laundering cases have been booked against 13 people, including former IAF chief
Agusta Westland helicopter deal (DC file)
It is the advent of a new political dispensation at the Centre that has led to the CBI acting with alacrity in the case of the AgustaWestland helicopter deal. No other reason can be attributed to the speed with which money-laundering cases have been booked against 13 people, including former IAF chief S.P Tyagi. The very fact that the deal had to do with the transportation of VVIPs — the addition of a consonant prefix to stress the importance of the people is a distinct Indian innovation which may actually be read as “very, very important politicians” — meant the CBI was seen to be capable of pussyfooting around the issue.
A suspicious change in the specifications allowing lowering of the service ceiling of the helicopters so that Westland could qualify for the tender, a not-so-opaque money trail and signs of criminality in openly using middlemen to allegedly bribe Indian officials meant a case of graft was quite strong. Even so, the investigation in India gathered impetus only after an Italian prosecutor stumbled upon the wheeling-dealing of Finmeccanica, the parent company of UK’s AgustaWestland.
Long jail terms are being sought in Italy for two heads of Finmeccanica — Giuseppe Orsi and Bruno Spagnolini — in connection with the Rs 3,600-crore deal. India is one of the fastest growing defence markets, but kickbacks in the buying of armaments are as old as the hills. Despite suffering much after the Bofors case, we seem to have learnt very little about how to handle arms purchases without compromising on quality and price.
( Source : dc )
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