Indian politics received a jolt during 1980 to 1990s owing to the details of the Bofors scandal coming out in the media. Bofors company officials had allegedly paid bribes to Indian and Swedish government leaders and officials to facilitate supply of 410 155mm Howitzer field guns. Prominent Congress leaders, including Prime Minister Rajeev Gandhi, and other senior leaders had also been named as the ones who had taken kickbacks from the Bofors Company. Many top Congress leaders, along with Rajeev Gandhi, had been accused of earning meaty profits from the Bofors deal. A Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was set up in the early 1990s, 27 years earlier, to investigate into the Bofors scam and the alleged kickbacks. PAC is a committee of selected MPs who are assigned the task of auditing the revenue and expenses of the Government of India. 15 members from the Lok Sabha and 7 from the Rajya Sabha are selected every year in the PAC. Mapanna Mallikarjun Kharge is the head of the PAC body today and according to the reports, it seems like he does not want the truth of the Bofors case to come out in the public.
It is very important to point out that even after 27 long years, there has not been much development in the Bofors case by any PAC committee. Biju Janata Dal MP Bhartruhari Mahtab was appointed as the head of the sub-committee to submit a report on the Bofors deal. Congress MP from Karnataka, Mallikarjun Kharge has long been accused of having a soft corner for the Nehru-Gandhi family and for his efforts in protecting the same. The extent to which PAC head Mallikarjun Kharge could go to defend his party leaders was exposed when PAC did not take up the report which was submitted by the BJD MP Mahtab. Not just satisfied with sitting over the report, Mallikarjun Kharge transferred the BJD MP to another sub-committee which is relatively an insignificant one. BJD MP Mahtab was left fuming after he found out that his report had not even been discussed and all his efforts went down the drain just because Kharge had the right as head of the PAC to transfer him.
BJD MP Mahtab signed his resignation from the committee citing reasons that the new committee was irrelevant and useless. His letter directed to PAC head Kharge reads, “There is no necessity to have a sub-committee on excesses over voted grants and charged appropriations. I decline to be associated with it. I would be happy if my name is deleted from this sub-committee of the present PAC,”
Kharge had been accused of amassing huge properties in the past too by misusing his power and position. Removal of Mahtab from the panel which had submitted a report on the Bofors scandal and was looking into the non-compliance of certain aspects of the CAG report of 1989-1990 on the Bofors deal hints towards Kharge’s favoritism shown to the Congress. Kharge had been named in a complaint under the Prevention of Corruption Act for having wealth disproportionate to the known sources of his income in the past. His close ties with the Nehru-Gandhi family and his disinterest in pursuing the Bofors deal points towards a possible effort to derail the Bofors investigation. The way in which BJD MP Mahtab’s efforts to expose the corruption in the deal have been thwarted it seems likely that Mallikarjun Kharge is intent upon protecting the Congress. A dishonorable act considering the blatant abuse of power being done by Kharge which is misuse of the position he has been assigned by the central government. Furthermore, the government must immediately take cognizance of Kharge’s abuse of authority and take required steps in order to prevent such unethical actions in the future as well as to bring to justice the culprits of the Bofors deal. BJP should, as well, raise the issue in the Parliament and raise questions on Kharge’s actions in suppressing the report and removal of Mahtab from the sub-committee.
