Maharashtra govt to order probe into leakage of CAG report, to file FIR

Cabinet wonders how CD version let out names when auditor didn?t mention them

The Congress-led government in Maharashtra is seeking the advocate general’s opinion to explore the options of filing of an FIR on the recent leakage of a report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), and move court even while instituting an inquiry into the matter. The administration also plans to find out whether the Cabinet can reject the leaked CAG report, which castigated the state government on alleged lapses in land deals and allotments over the past eight years, and ask the apex auditor to submit a fresh report.

The government has already announced that it would table the report on April 16 after BJP legislator Devendra Phadnis submitted a CD version of the auditor’s report last Friday before state assembly speaker Dilip Walse-Patil. The CAG, in the leaked report, had pulled up the state government for alleged irregularities and loss incurred during the sale and allotment of land to various parties, some of them ministers and legislators.

On Thursday, the issue came up for discussion at the state cabinet met under chief minister Prithviraj Chavan. Ministers from both the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party expressed their anger over the leakage of report, especially for letting known the names of ministers and bureaucrats who were “beneficiaries” of the land allotments. They argued that the CAG report submitted to the government did not carry any names, even as the pertinent disc contain them.

After the meeting, Chavan admitted that the issue did come up for discussion. “We will seek the advocate general’s views for taking future course of action,” he told Business Standard.

The meeting with advocate general Darais Khambata is slated for tomorrow.

A senior Congress minister said the government was “quite clear” that those involved in the leakage of CAG report before its tabling in the legislature deserved punishment. “They should be exposed. Under certain rules of Maharashtra Revenue Code, ministers, legislators and bureaucrats are entitled for allotment of land for specific purposes if they comply with certain conditions,” he told this newspaper.

“We were unanimous in our view that the CAG’s job is to audit and not to carry investigations,” the minister said. “Nobody becomes an accused simply based on the CAG's findings. Its report is examined by the Public Accounts Committee, which subsequently submits its report to the state legislature.”

An NCP minister, on the other hand, said there was an agreement among the cabinet ministers over the filing of an FIR and conducting a high-level probe into the leakage of the report. “One view was to outrightly reject the CAG report in the present format. The Cabinet must do it,” he added. “The CAG should then be asked to file a fresh report, which will be later tabled to the legislature. A decision on this will be taken after seeking the advocate-general’s opinion.”

The controversial CAG report had made critical observations on the land allotted to the Manjra Education Society promoted by union minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, the Mumbai Education Trust promoted by state public works minister Chhagan Bhujbal, the Sindhudurg Shikshan Prasarak Mandal affiliated to industries minister Narayan Rane, the Bharati Vidyapith formed by forest minister Patangrao Kadam and the Vikhe Patil Foundation affiliated to agriculture minister Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil.