The Rajya Sabha on Tuesday adopted by voice vote the motion for the appointment of a Joint Parliamentary Committee to examine the issues relating to 2G spectrum allocation, after a three-hour debate often marked by acrimony between the ruling parties and the Opposition.
Moving the motion, Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal targeted the Bharatiya Janata Party for the alleged lapses in spectrum allocation during the National Democratic Alliance rule and said that at no point from 2001 to 2009, after the revenue-sharing arrangement was agreed upon, was spectrum ever priced.
“Rightly or wrongly, the policy enunciated by the then government in 2003 was sought to be followed by the United Progressive Alliance-I and UPA-II,” he said.
The Minister said the first come, first served policy —whether it was contrary to a Cabinet decision or not — served the public purpose (of increase in teledensity). “But when it comes to implementation and on criminal culpability, the government has said that the law must take its course.”
Referring to the original policy of 1999 for migration to revenue-sharing “announced by a caretaker government when the Lok Sabha elections were to take place,” he said: “We need to apply our mind that policy pronouncements of this magnitude should be done pursuant to a decision-making process through consultations with all political parties and through the forum of Parliament.”
Supporting the motion, Leader of the Opposition Arun Jaitley (BJP) said the “improprieties and misdemeanours” in the 2G spectrum scam had shaken the collective conscience of the nation and the public confidence in the system.
Attacking the government for trying to draw a “moral equivalence” between the NDA and UPA regimes, he said: “It is not a UPA or NDA issue. It is a case where a policy formulation has been in the process of over 17 or 18 years and therefore, we must seriously look at what went wrong and where correctives are required.”
In 1993-94 the then government might have gone wrong — not deliberately — in the formulation of the public-private partnership policy, “as the sector had just opened up,” Mr. Jaitley said. The shift was made to revenue-sharing as there were not many takers for licence in under-served West Bengal, Bihar, Orissa and the northeast, but the process in 2007 was “rigged.”
Charging the government with “granting spectrum licences in 2007 at 2001 price,” he said, “the goalposts were changed midway, the date of application became the date of compliance … in 41 minutes the whole operation was over.”
Tapan Kumar Sen (CPI-M) said that to say that 2G allotment had increased teledensity was “legitimising a fraud on the people.”
D. Raja (CPI) wanted the JPC to address all policy issues. “It should suggest safeguards. Nobody should go scot-free. It should be effective so that the country gains. The cynicism has to end.”
The debate was marked by sharp exchanges between the DMK's Tiruchi Siva and V. Maitreyan of the AIADMK when the latter alleged that the family of some senior leaders in Tamil Nadu had benefited from the 2G allocation. This charge was refuted by Mr. Siva, who requested the chair to expunge the names of people who were not members of the House.
