Crisis over, for now: Chidu accepts Pranab's explanation

New Delhi: Home Minister P Chidmanbaram today accepted Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s explanation on the controversial note from the Finance Ministry to the Prime Minister’s Office and said the matter is closed.

Mukherjee after eight days of parleys among different levels of the government and the Congress party read out a statement putting the blame on the bureaucrats of his ministry.

Speaking after Mukherjee, the Home Minister said that he agrees with Finance Minister and the matter stands closed.

In the very cryptic press briefing outside North Block in New Delhi, the government took the opportunity to put up an united front with Home Minister P Chidambaram, Telecommunication & HRD Minister Kapil Sibal and Law Minister Salman Khurshid present in that briefing.

However, within half an hour of Mukherjee’s statement, the BJP slammed him saying that his disapproval of the note is insignificant as it is a matter concerning the government exchequer and not an ego battle between ministers.

BJP spokesperson Ravi Sankar Prasad said, “Home Minister P Chidambaram has no right to accept Mukherjee’s explanation.You are an accused, Mr Chidambaram,” he said directly blaming Chidambaram.

“I do not agree with the UPA government stand that they carried forward a NDA regime decision taken on 2003 on spectrum pricing. The government stands exposed,” said Prasad.

“This country is not going to accept this completely untenable explanation of Pranab Mukherjee,” he said.

It may be recalled that on Monday, Chidambaram reportedly offered to resign in a 20-minute meeting he had with Congress president Sonia Gandhi at her 10 Janpath residence in New Delhi. He had earlier offered his resignation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over the 2G note controversy.

Janata Party president Subramanium Swamy called for CBI’s investigation of Chidambaram while the BJP raised the clamour demanding Chidambaram’s resignation. This was also the first time that differences between senior ministers in the government came to the fore.

During all this hullabaloo of eight days, the BJP upped the ante demanding immediate resignation from the Home Minister and prosecution by the court.

“There is so much evidence that has come out against P Chidambaram in the 2G spectrum case that for CBI to say in court now that he is not guilty would be laughable. Chidambaram’s place is in the same cell in Tihar jail in which A Raja has been lodged,” BJP leader Yashwant Sinha said earlier.

CPI general secretary A B Bardhan also called it a “very serious charge” has been levelled against Chidambaram by the Finance Ministry and demanded a thorough probe into his role. Asked whether Chidambaram should now quit, he said, “When the investigation begins, then the question of his resignation will come up. First, the horse and then the horse cart”.

Amid all that opposition attack, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee are putting up a brace front and trying their best to defend the Home Minister. Singh described Chidambaram as ’trustworthy’ while Mukherjee called him a ‘valued colleague’.

“Not only we are behind the Home Minister, we are all together united on the issue,” Law Minister Salman Khurshid said when asked if the government was backing the Home Minister who is facing allegations on the issue.

The document that was prepared on 11 March this year by deputy director P G S Rao in the Finance Ministry’s department of economic affairs on the allocation and pricing of 2G spectrum from 2003 and sent it to the Prime Minister. The document came to the public domain as a response to a Right to Information query and on a platter for litigant Subramanian Swamy and the opposition BJP.

The accompanying information—“A copy of basic facts prepared on allocation and pricing of 2G spectrum is enclosed. This has been seen by the finance minister (Pranab Mukherjee)”—perhaps gave the UPA government the biggest shocker in its second term.

Chidambaram stands implicated in the memorandum for his decision on the spectrum pricing when he was the country’s Finance Minister.

The memorandum said, “…the fact that a Telecom Commission meeting on the issue was scheduled on 15 January 2008 was also mentioned; no response, however, was sent by DEA to DoT… Finally, a note was sent by the then finance minister (Chidambaram) to the Prime Minister on 15 January 2008… The note of the finance minister did not deal with the need, if any, to revise entry fee or the rate of revenue share.”

Watch Pranab Mukherjee and PC Chidambaram’s statement on the 2G note: