CBI blind to key movers of Agusta deal, only chasing small fry

M.K. Narayanan; former chief of the Special Prot ection Group and later Goa Governor, Bharat Wanchoo; former Defence Secretary and current Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India, Shashi Kant Sharma; former Defence Secretary Vijay Singh, who occupied the said post between 2007 and 2009; and at least two top Congress leaders, one of whom has close connections with a well known arms dealer.

However, sources close to these bureaucrats state that there is no evidence to suggest that they had done anything wrong or illegal and that they had done their job without any fear or favour.

The CBI had, initially, after a great deal of media pressure, questioned Wan- choo and Narayanan in June-July 2014, but nothing happened after that.

“The top bureaucrats, some of whom enjoyed top posts even after retirement and played a major role in swinging the deal for Agusta, were never seriously probed by any agency despite having sufficient evidence to start a Preliminary Enquiry (PE) against them. Even the involvement of two senior Congress lead- ers is well known, but they still remain out of bounds. The CBI is unlikely to touch any of the top people involved in the deal. At the most what the agency can do is to plant stories that sing paeans in its praise, which it has been doing lately through informal media briefings,” said a senior intelligence officer in the know.

The CBI, which arrested former Air Chief S.P. Tyagi, for his alleged role in the scam, was left red faced after the court gave him bail, despite the agency informally briefing beat reporters repeatedly that it had an airtight case against him.

According to the intelligence officer, the discussion to revise the flying height was held in a 7 March 2005 meeting chaired by Deputy Chief of Air Staff (DCAS) at the Air HQ and was also attended by the Joint Secre- tary & Acquisition Manager (Air), Director SPG and other officers from Air HQ. It was decided at the meeting to reduce the height altitude capability to 4,500 metres.

“Why single out Tyagi? Does the Air Chief have the power to single-handedly okay a deal worth Rs 3,700 crore for helicopters that are to be used for civilian VVIPs? In fact it was the Air Force headquarters, which had, time and again, reiterated that the helicopter’s ability to fly at 6,000 metre was absolutely necessary. The other officials who played an important part in the whole deal are very influential people and even those who have retired still yield considerable clout in the present government circle. It is many of their juniors and protégés who are in a position to initiate a thorough probe against them and hence I do not think that the CBI or other agencies will move beyond people like Tyagi in this case”, said the officer.

A similar argument was made by Tyagi’s lawyer Menaka Guruswamy while successfully seeking bail for him. She stated that the helicopters were bought for VVIP civilians and it was the concerned bureaucracy which was involved in the whole decision making, rather than Tyagi.