Former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Monday said his son Karti had never met any officer connected with the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) and had no links with the applicant company INX Media, against which the Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case.
According to the CBI, Mr. Karti allegedly received money from INX Media, through Chennai-based Advantage Strategic Consulting Pvt. Ltd, to help it wriggle out of a possible probe into the use of foreign funds it had got from three Mauritius-based investors in 2007.
“Karti Chidambaram was never a director or shareholder of Advantage Strategic Consulting Pvt Ltd (ASCPL). The promoters/directors of ASCPL have, on more than one occasion, made it clear that ASCPL is their company and they alone are responsible for the business of that company,” said the former Finance Minister. He said the ASCPL promoters/directors were business friends of his son.
Mr. Chidambaram said his son and his business friends were being targeted. “I am indignant that some of the most distinguished civil servants of the country have been humiliated by the FIR. In the instant case, it is not one Secretary but six Secretaries (and the FIPB secretariat) who are being humiliated on a ridiculous charge of being induced by an alleged gratification of Rs.10 lakh,” he said.
The senior Congress leader said he issued the statement “so that the misinformation emanating from Chennai is exposed. Ultimately, the course of law will expose the mischief makers. I have advised my son to fully co-operate with the investigation and he will do so”.
Mr. Chidambaram said in the past two weeks, leaks and insinuations had been deliberately fed to a section of the media and maliciously circulated in the social media. “In fact, I have obtained a copy of the FIR from the social media. The origin of these leaks is Çhennai in my home state of Tamil Nadu,” he said.
He said the FIR alleged that there was a conspiracy involving public officials who were induced by corrupt and illegal means to grant the approval, yet it did not name a single public official. “The most ridiculous allegation is that the so-called gratification was a cheque for Rs.10 lakh,” he said, adding that the cheque was in favour of a consulting company that had raised an invoice for work done, accounted for the income, and paid income tax on the amount.
The CBI alleges that while INX Media had approached Mr. Karti Chidambaram’s company Chess Management Services for consultancy on the queries raised by the FIPB unit, the money was paid to ASCPL.
The FIPB was chaired by Secretary, Economic Affairs, and included four other Secretaries (Industry, Commerce, External Affairs and Overseas Indian Affairs) and Secretary of the Administrative Ministry. Its recommendations were submitted to the Finance Ministry, where they were examined by junior officers and then by the Additional Secretary and the Secretary, before being put up to the Minister. Each file contained a number of cases.
Mr. P. Chidambaram said he had never allowed any family member to speak to him or to any officer of his Ministry on any official matter. “It is, therefore, preposterous to suggest that a member of my family, with or without my knowledge, influenced, by corrupt or illegal means, the six Secretaries who constituted the FIPB,” he said.
The former Finance Minister said he approved only those FIPB cases that were recommended by the Board and put up to him by Secretary, Economic Affairs.
