Commentary/T V R Shenoy
The urea scamsters put Zardari to shame. They weren't content with anything less than 100%.
Which is the worst government office in Delhi? Is it I K Gujral's
eternally-appeasing foreign office, the dormant home ministry
led by Comrade Indrajit Gupta, or Joginder Singh's CBI?
The competition is intense, and each has received its share of
richly-deserved abuse. So isn't it surprising that one of them
insists on keeping absolute silence over a real achievement?
On January 3, 1997, Joginder Singh's men found Rs 4.05 million --
allegedly part of the loot from the Rs 1.33 billion urea scam. All
of it was, I believe, in the form of crisp, new Rs 500 notes.
And all of it was found in a sealed locker in Hyderabad.
Yet neither the CBI nor the Enforcement Directorate want to give
any publicity to the fact. And therein lies a story.
During his short tenure as prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee
put the urea scam investigation on a firm basis. This forced the
CBI to wake up. The investigators found that part of the stolen
money had returned to India, and was deposited in a bank locker.
At this point, the Vajpayee ministry was unseated. The then CBI
director, Vijaya Rama Rao, promptly ordered his officers to seal
the locker without opening it. Joginder Singh, his successor,
saw no reason to unseal it. And all this at a time when CBI officers
were flying all over the world in search of clues!
But the CBI wasn't the only body after the money. P Chidambaram's
Enforcement Directorate too was on the scent. These sleuths found
that the locker had remained sealed for close to five months.
They reported back to Delhi. But the finance minister chose not
to interfere.
On November 19, 1996, the CBI began to stir. (Significantly, the
winter session of Parliament was about to open.) To keep the cover-up
going yet still give an impression of action, the CBI hit upon
a legalistic defence.
They served a notice on A V R Krishnamoorthy. (Krishnamoorthy was
once one of the most powerful men in India as officer on special
duty in the PMO in the Rao regime.) Krishnamoorthy denied ownership.
Joginder Singh's men went back to sleep.
The truth is finally out. The locker belongs to A V R Krishnamoorthy's
son, Anand (who allegedly played a role in getting complicated
hawala transactions).
Several questions must be asked? Why did the CBI take seven months
to open the locker? (Two months after the Enforcement Directorate
asked it to do so!)
The CBI is hiding behind the stale excuse of ownership. This is
nonsense. Let us remember what Joginder Singh himself said after
raiding Sukh Ram's residences.
The director cheerfully stated that sealed lockers and safes could
be opened even in Sukh Ram's absence, with permission from the
court if necessary. Yet in the case of the locker in Hyderabad,
there was no talk of obtaining judicial sanction.
To return to the Sukh Ram case, the CBI found over Rs 36.5 million in his residences.
Only a fraction of that -- less than Rs 500,000
rupees -- was found in the lockers. The ratio is over 1:70.
This makes sense. No crook is going to keep the bulk of his funds
in a locker that can be searched at any time. He will prefer to
keep most of the loot with him.
In Sukh Ram's case the strategy didn't work because the raid was
conducted in some secrecy. Here, the owner of the locker was given
a full seven months notice that he was being investigated!
Let us assume that the 1:70 ratio kept by Sukh Ram was the standard
adopted by the last Congress regime. In this case, then, Rs 4 million in
the bank is worth Rs 280 million at home.
Harshad Mehta proved Rs 10 million can be stuffed into one
suitcase. I am sure 28 suitcases can be transported to a new hiding
place, given seven months. (Along with documents?)
Of course, that figure of Rs 280 million is purely an estimate. It
could be less. Or it could be much more -- remember that the total
amount stolen in the urea scam was a massive Rs 1.33 billion.
Remember too that the urea scam is unique in many ways. Unlike
Bofors all the money was looted, not just part of it. Second,
no agents like Win Chadha were involved, only officers in the
Prime Minister's Office and members of the Rao clan.
Asif Zardari, Benazir Bhutto's husband, was nicknamed 'Mr 10%'
for his corrupt activities. The urea scamsters put him to shame.
They weren't content with anything less than 100%.
But nobody seems to care even now. In fact, both the CBI and the
Enforcement Directorate are keeping unusually low profiles.
When Sukh Ram was raided, the CBI director took camera crews on
a guided tour of the Congressman's palatial mansion. When Jayalalitha
was raided, pictures of her wealth were splashed on television and every
newspaper within 24 hours. Why is Anand Krishnamoorthy being treated
with such respect?
Was it fear of Narasimha Rao that accounts for the seven month
gap between finding the locker and opening it? If so, the grace
period may be at the end.
Notice the significance of January 3, 1997 when the locker was
opened. It is the same day that Sitaram Kesri took over as CPP
leader from Narasimha Rao!
|