The Prime Minister's office responded to The Hindu two reports which was carried on Monday on the 2G issue
“Two reports appeared in The Hindu today [on Monday] regarding the 2G licensing and spectrum allocation matter which is currently being looked into by the JPC, PAC and the CBI.
2. The reports allege that “New Papers show PMO analysed and agreed with Raja’s actions before 2G scam” and that “Within 2 weeks of the 2G scam, PM wanted ‘arm’s length’ from Raja”. The first report has a box item which says that “PMO was in agreement that start-up spectrum be allocated at ‘normal rates’. This implies no revision in entry fee, a crime for which the CBI charge sheet accuses Raja.”
Factual inaccuracy
3. The Hindu report is factually incorrect. The inaccuracies are:
(1) The report claims that it is based on ‘new papers’ and ‘new evidence’. This is factually incorrect as all documents have been in the public domain for a long time now. Copies of these documents have been submitted to the JPC and PAC. Therefore, this is not a case where some new material has been discovered suddenly, as the report claims.
(2) The primary material on which the report is based and the noting quoted in the report that “PM wants this informally shared with the Department. Does not want formal communication and wants the PMO to remain at arm’s length please” has been widely reported in the past and on which a detailed clarification was issued by the Prime Minister’s Office on 31st July, 2011. Therefore, there is no ‘new material’ on which the reports are based. The “new” papers and evidence which the reports rely on are mentioned in Para 3 (a)-(d) of the PMO’s Press Release. This has been widely reported in the past and is not fresh material.
Clarifications in the past
4. The PMO Press Release of 31st July, 2011 refers to the same set of papers and clarifies the situation clearly. The clarification is reproduced:
“2. The note of the Prime Minister's Office, on which the above noting was recorded, proposed consideration of an approach as follows:
a) Fix a ‘threshold’ level of spectrum that each operator must have in order to function with a minimum level of efficiency.
b) Existing operators holding spectrum above the threshold level may be allowed a certain amount of time to raise the subscriber levels to reach full utilisation of spectrum, failing which the excess spectrum may be withdrawn.
c) New operators may be allotted spectrum only up to the threshold level on payment of the normal fees.
d) The balance spectrum may then be auctioned among all those who hold spectrum up to the threshold level.
3. The proposal of the Prime Minister’s Office was to forward these suggestions to the Department of Telecom for further consideration on the basis of individual consultations with the main players and TRAI.
4. It was well known at that time that there were conflicting interests between existing operators and new entrants. The Prime Minister felt that this matter required detailed examination and deliberation by the Department of Telecom in consultation with TRAI and others. He felt that, under the circumstances, it was not appropriate for the Prime Minister’s Office to pronounce on the matter till the subject had been carefully considered by the administrative ministry in consultation with TRAI and other concerned departments. Therefore, it was sent as an informal suggestion to the Department of Telecom for consideration.
5. The above clearly brings out that the noting under question can in no way be construed to mean that the Prime Minister or his office looked the other way on matters relating to the grant of licence or spectrum charges etc. It related solely to the manner in which the approach summarised above should be conveyed to the Department of Telecom to be considered on merits without being viewed as a direction from the Prime Minister or his office.”
5. In his Statement in Parliament, the Prime Minister has clearly stated the concern about wrong doings was not about the first-come first-served policy but the manner in which it was implemented and whether it was implemented appropriately. Excerpts from the Prime Minister’s statement in Rajya Sabha are reproduced below:
“… The Government’s policy of the pricing of Spectrum was taken on the basis of a Cabinet decision of 2003 which specifically left the issue to be determined by the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Telecommunication… the record clearly shows that the then Minister, while he initially had a different view which he communicated to me on January 15, 2008, subsequently consulted the Minister, Telecommunication and the two Ministers worked out an agreed formula on Spectrum charges, which was reported to me in a meeting on July 4, 2008. Furthermore, this decision that was put to me by the two Ministers was in line with the recommendation of TRAI in its Report of August, 2007. In that Report, the TRAI had clearly stated that only 3G Spectrum should be auctioned and the policy for 2G Spectrum should continue on the same basis as hitherto.
This recommendation of TRAI was based on the need to ensure a level-playing field between the new entrants and the incumbents. The two Ministers had agreed on this because of legacy consideration and I accepted their recommendation. Sir, on the issue of implementation of the first-come first-served policy, the situation is more complex. I was categorically assured by the then Minister of Telecommunication that the policy was being implemented appropriately with one departure, which was cleared by the Solicitor General. Subsequent developments suggest that this was not the case. The matter was taken up for investigation by the CBI in 2009. The Government at no stage interfered with this investigation… No one should have any doubt that those found guilty of manipulating the system unfairly will be severely dealt with under the law.”
6. Excerpts from the Prime Minister’s statement in the Lok Sabha are reproduced below:
“People ask me why then all these concerns about the wrong-doings. My respectful answer to that is that when I looked at the telecom situation in 2007-2008, the proposal that came to me was that the Ministry had decided not to go in for auctions. At that time, it had the support of the technical arm of the telecom regulatory system, the TRAI; it had the support of the concerned Ministry; and I felt that for level-playing field, it was entirely appropriate that we should continue on the path which we had followed until 2007.
Then subsequently it turned out to be that while the policy was sound, the way it was implemented, I think, gave rise to problems.
Those problems will now be looked into by the JPC; they are being looked into by the PAC; and if there are any criminal aspects, they are being looked into by the CBI.”
7. The Hindu reports only selectively repeat what was already known and was clarified both by Prime Minister in Parliament and in the Press Release of 31.7.201.”
Keywords: 2G spectrum scandal, 2G scam, JPC probe, The Hindu report, PMO response, A. Raja plea, PMO, UPA scams, political scandals, Manmohan Singh government
Shalini Singh and the Hindu deserve our gratitude for the startling revelation regarding the 2G spectrum and the part played by various actors in this sordid drama which should shake the conscience of every right-thinking person. It would appear that, in spite of vehement denials, our PM was kept fully in the picture by minister Raja on his controversial proposal regarding allocation of spectrum licenses to various parties in gross violation of accepted norms. PM had every opportunity to put an end to this unethical proposal but compulsions of coalition drama-not dharma - prevented him from doing so, resulting in unimaginable loss to the State Exchequer. We are paying a heavy price for having voted to power a set of politicians whose sole motive is service to self rather than service to the nation. Let us not repeat that mistake in the 2014 general elections. .
It has been such a long time since the scam broke out. The Supreme Court found it best to cancel the licences in the case of corruption committed by people in power. After a year of cancellation of licences, what has happened? People working in these organisations whose licences were cancelled have lost their jobs and, in many cases, their livelihood, too. Weel-qualified individuals have been forced to accept jobs not befitting the merit they possess. Meanwhile, the actual perpetrators of this scam roam around rollicking in their ill-gotten gains.
Nothing will change unless there is mass disgust and an unflinching
will to put things right, at least for the sake of the future
generations!! The Hindu performs a magnificent role in informing the people of
India, when the paid media is in cahoots with the looters. I have only admiration for responsible journalists like Ms Shalini
Singh. May God preserve her, and may other journalists follow in her
footsteps.
It seems The Hindu wants to support CAGs version that the 2G spectrum was to have been auctioned. PMO is correct in claiming that auction was not preferred. The questionable policy decision was the "First come, first serve" basis adopted and the scam pertains only to the implementation of first come, first serve policy.
As a person who has worked in the field, I can fully appreciate the logic behind the policy, and over the years I observe that all the assumptions proved to be right.
My request to "The Hindu" will be to assign reporters who understand the subject to report on the matter and not sensationalise minor technicalities.
Please republish these letter on weekly basis to remind our people to bring clean leaders in future.
When a goverment repeats same mistakes again and again & still keeps powerless ministers, what is wrong in telling people same thing again and again as a new finding?
To root the evil and recover the public money, media should champion the cause, which
Hindu took to their shoulders.
Sundaram, which people are believing that PM has nothing to do in the 2Gscam? His
silence as they say, amounts to oral approval. Also the dead horse as you say cost Indian
citizens' tax payers more than 1.76 lakh crores which would have wiped out atleast half the
public debt each Indian is carrying on his head for no fault of his. No one other than who got
benefited by this 2G scam will advice to ignore the facts brought about by Ms Shalini Singh
with great effort and risk. Do not belittle her work unless you have some vested interest in
this matter.
The first two commenters have clearly not read the original article.
Rather than Ms Singh, it is this reply from the PMO which is selective
in the points it claims to rebut.
Points 3(1) and 3(2) are exactly the same and could be made together
rather than separately for dramatic effect.
The PMO has not responded to the fact that Mr Raja's re-defined FCFS
model was communicated to the PM.
Ms Singh has referred to several notes, files etc which establish that
the PM agreed to the changes in the FCFS model. These references(quite
prominently presented in separate paragraphs in a short to medium
length article) have somehow escaped the attention of our country's
leading civil servants (One wonders how). These invalidate the PM's
statements in Parliament as reproduced in this report.
Ms Singh's article reminds and in several cases updates Indians of the
extreme magnitude of Dr Singh's carelessness, if indeed that is all
he's guilty of.
There's something rotten in the PMO
Whether "new scam reoprt" or "old scam reoprt", scam is a scam. God knows when Supreme court will finish this case.
Its in the line of what this corrupt set of ministers and babus (perhaps the most corrupt in the history of post independent India)have been doing.Just sabotage the investigations and just shamelessly deny the mountain of evidence available in the public domain.The pmo reply has not specifically denied or replied to any of the points and allegation bought out by shalini singh and simply present a rehash of the poor counter they have been peddleing in the paid media around the circuit.No surprise they resort to slander on sligetest provocation .As aptly stated by socrates "Slander is the last resort of the defeated"
I am sorry, The Hindu is boring readers with minutiae of the 2G Scam. There is already a case being heard by the Special court CBI. Everyone believes that the PM was not involved in bribe taking. Then what is the insinuation here? The process of government decision making is tortuous, not easy like sitting in front of a typewriter and belting away an article . I am of the opinion for what it is worth, that PMO genuinely thought that FCFS was good for threshold spectrum and the Telecom Minister botched it during implementation for reasons best known to him. There is no need to flog this dead horse for ever unless significant development takes place.
When your report was first published several readers claimed it as
a scoop and investigative journalism, etc. But it appears you've
only reported what has already been available in the public domain.
Don't you have anything to respond to PMO's response? When you say
based on 'new documents available with you' it is expected to be
'new', i.e that which is not already available in the public
domain.
Earlier it was also reported in Hindu in the BEML scam, TKA Nair of PMO got house plots alloted illegally from BEML employees society at the behest of Natarajan the-then-CMD of the company for overlooking his misdeeds. Of course, Nair's kin subsequently withdrew from the deal after it became public. So Manmohanji has people in his office who can change the perspectives to suit deals by ministers of UPA and senior executives of his government with appropriate English jargon which can be interpreted either way. But in the 2G case, no amount of English will save PM and FM of their full awareness of what Raja was doing in the scam.
Since I do not believe either our Prime minister’s credibility or PMO's
report in the 2G scam, Ms. Shalini sing may throw some light on this
report for the benefit our 'Hindu' readers.
Do we need a PM if his office only makes suggestions to the various ministries to consider(all references made to him)on merits without being viewed as a direction from the PM or his office.
Such controversy brigs bad impression on foreign countries who are
actually seeking to exploit corruption in India for their political
gain.There are other ways to expose the affair if true.
Therefore we deny all the charges in its entirety. What 200 Crores? What
2G tapes? What horse trading by Nira Radia?...We deny everything. We'll
let Kapil do the talking for us or else Diggy do the talking on our
behalf. So we preponed the allocation dates..so? So we set the price
that was set by the previous NDA Govt, even though the customer base
grew by a 100 fold..so? This is nothing new. This is the way we do
business. Don't forget to vote in 2014..ok
The two articles by Shalini Singh unearthing new evidence and the rebuttal by P M O office and the rejoinder thereof by Shalini Singh all read in conjunction prima facie prove that there many more skeletons in the cupboard
Even if the material is old, it does not absolve the PMO from 2G scam.
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