BJP, Left slam govt on Quattrocchi issue

Gandhinagar/New Delhi, Apr 28 (PTI) India's main
opposition BJP and the Left parties Tuesday slammed the ruling
UPA on the issue of the country's premier investigating agency
Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) dropping Bofors case
accused Ottavio Quattrocchi's name from its list of wanted
people, alleging that the government had misused the agency
even as the Law Ministry said it played no role in it.

The Congress hit out at the BJP for trying to
"politicise" the matter while making it clear that the party
had "nothing to do" with the Italian businessman.

Reacting to the CBI move asking the Interpol to drop
Quattrocchi's name from the Red Corner notice list, senior
leader L K Advani held both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and
Congress President Sonia Gandhi "guilty" for the move and said
NDA will examine the issue if voted to power.

"If this news is true then I consider both the Prime
Minister and the Congress President guilty," he told reporters
in Gandhinagar, alleging that the action showed the
"desperation" of the government before being "voted out".

But Law Minister H R Bhardwaj said that the government
had no role to play in the issue and rejected as "politically
motivated" the opposition charges.

The Left parties said the move was the "latest episode
of misuse" of CBI and "another step" to bury the Bofors case.

Advani, who is campaigning in his constituency, demanded
a probe into the working of the CBI in the last five years.

"This is a serious decision. It is not a question of
Quattrocchi alone but the entire role of the agency during the
last five years which should be probed. They have become the
'dastak' or 'handtool' in the hands of politicians," he said.

Terming the CBI as "Congress Bureau of Investigation",
BJP spokesman Prakash Javadekar alleged that the Congress'
"only mission was to free the personal family friends of the
Gandhi family and they have accomplished it".

In a strongly-worded statement, CPI (M) Polit Bureau
said, "Coming in the wake of the failure to successfully
prosecute all those involved in the bribery case, it is
evident that as long as there is a Congress-led government in
office, the subversion of justice will continue".

CPI National Secretary D Raja said that it was now upto
the Congress-led UPA and CBI to explain their position on the
matter which had generated "a lot of controversy".

While Forward Bloc National Secretary D Deverajan said
the move "revealed the ugly face" of the Congress, RSP leader
Abani Roy it was "not the first incident of misuse" of the
CBI by the Congress.

Dismissing the opposition charges, senior Congress
leader M Veerappa Moily said, "We have nothing to do with
Quattrocchi. The Bofors case has been in the public (domain)
for over two decades. If there was any proof of his
involvement in the scam, the NDA, which had ruled the country
earlier, should have taken some steps".

Moily said the Congress had never interfered in the
affairs of the CBI or any other agency and would never do so
in the future.

Maintaining that the Centre has no role in the CBI
action, the Law Minister said that the Red Corner notice was
issued by the Interpol on the basis a non-bailable warrant
against Quattrocchi.

"Later, it transpired during the extradition proceedings
against the accused in Argentina that there was no such
non-bailable warrant in existence...The court there held that
there was no such warrant and he had been arrested in
violation of the law and ordered that he should be set free."

Bhardwaj said Quattrocchi had appealed before the
Interpol Commission, which deals with Red Corner notices, and
it had in turn sought explanation from the CBI.

"The Red corner notices are issued for five years. When
the notice was about to expire, the CBI sent the matter to
Attorney General (AG) for legal opinion. The AG, having gone
into the matter of wrongful detention of the gentleman in
Argentina, had opined that it was not a sustainable order
because there was no such warrant".

Bharadwaj said that the case was still pending in trial
court and in the Supreme Court and law will take its own
course.

In Lucknow, UP Chief Minister and BSP leader Mayawati
termed the CBI move as an "act of desperation" by the Congress
and demanded that the decision be revoked and the guilty in
the scam be punished. PTI Team
PMR
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