Cong digs up BJP ‘dirt’ in Spectrum 2.0 ‘scam’

The Congress on Wednesday accused the Centre of making "surreptitious" efforts to defer the recovery of spectrum auction amount from private telecom players by six years, which it claimed would cause a loss of Rs 23,821 crore to the exchequer, and dubbed it as "spectrum scam 2.0".

Party spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala alleged that to help the telecom companies in a clandestine manner, an interministerial committee comprising Telecom and Finance Ministry was constituted and it decided to alter the auction terms by recommending payment of Rs 33,789.12 crore within 16 years (19 years after counting the no-payment period of first three years) instead of the original 10 years.”

Accusing the Centre of "wilfully" deferring the recovery to benefit "crony capitalists," the spokesperson asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the two ministries to come clean on the issue. Speaking to reporters here, Surjewala claimed the two ministries had approved the deferment and a final decision is pending before the Union Cabinet.

He said the Modi Government has clearly violated the Supreme Court directive on auction of public resources by using its discretionary power to help three telecom firms. The court had laid down while deciding the 2G scam case in 2012 that the state should have no discretion while ordering adoption of "a completely nondiscriminatory method" in distribution of the natural resources to protect the national and public interest.

He added the government cannot amend the terms of auction "to grant benefits that are neither legally nor contractually permissible". "The BJP government's plea that the three telecom companies are facing adverse financial condition arising on account of competitive pressure cannot be a ground to alter terms of auction to provide relief to them," he added.