NDA to pin Govt on Scorpene deal

     New Delhi: The opposition National Democratic Alliance today announced plans to question the government over reports of kickbacks worth Rs.18,000 crore (approximately four billion dollars) in the Scorpene deal and the Navy war room leak case. As Parliament convenes after a brief interlude, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha L.K.Advani told reporters here that the opposition will question the Government on the deal which he believed was far 'bigger' corruption case than Bofors. Advani demanded the immediate termination of the submarine deal and the institution of a credible enquiry commission to look into the Navy's war room leak case. The Indian Government's decision last October to sign a contract with the French company Thales for the procurement of six Scorpene submarines for the Indian Navy at a whooping 18,798 crore rupees along with a tax component of Rs 3,553 crore, is said to be the biggest ever single arms purchase contract undertaken by New Delhi.

     However, the deal that took four years to materialise did not take even four months to run into controversy as "Outlook" magazine came up with an allegation that four percent of the deal amount was paid as kickback to the middlemen involved in the deal by the French company. The magazine substantiated this claim with an e-mail from Thales' top honcho Jean-Paul Perrier to the alleged middleman Abhishek Verma that read ''We confirm the payment of four percent of the Scorpene contract price". Though Perrier has stated that the e-mail is forged, he has not denied not having any contact with Verma. The Navy's war room leak case is the offshoot of the alleged irregularities exposed through the Scorpene deal. The Navy had constituted a board of enquiry after intelligence officers had recovered a pen drive from a senior Air Force officer Wing Commander S.L. Surve in December, which contained classified Naval information. The officer was on deputation with the Directorate of Naval operation. However, three Navy officers were summarily dismissed in October in a 'War Room Leak'. But rather than being court-martialled, they were sacked. Significantly no interrogation was carried out on a close relative of the serving Navy chief Admiral Arun Prakash who is said to be linked to Abhishek Verma and also is the alleged recipient of the leaked information that also included information about the submarine deal. The UPA Government has already dismissed the allegations levelled by the magazine as full of discrepancies.

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