Congress used JPC to subvert truth: BJP

Bangalore, April 19 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Friday said the Congress tried to "subvert" the truth by using the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) which absolved Prime Minster Manmohan Singh of all the charges in the 2G spectrum allocation case.

"This is the second time in history that the Congress and UPA, who are neck deep in corruption, have subverted the truth using the JPC mechanism," BJP leader Arun Jaitley said here.

Referring to the Bofors scam, Jaitley said the then JPC, constituted to look into the scam, tabled a fictional report.

"If the JPC found that they were innocent, this JPC report will meet the same fate as the Bofors JPC. Its credibility will probably be worse than earlier JPCs," Jaitley said.

The report said that Singh was "misled" by former telecom minister A. Raja, whose assurances stood "belied" and also rubbished the loss figure of Rs.1.76 lakh crore estimated by the Comptroller and Auditor General, saying it was "ill-conceived".

Meanwhile, talking to TV news channel NDTV, Jaitley termed the leakage of the draft of the JPC report on the 2G scam as a "gross breach of Parliamentary propriety".

"I have not seen the JPC report yet as officially most members have not received it till today (Friday) afternoon. The fact that it was leaked to the media means it is a propaganda document," he told NDTV.

"This draft, if it ever takes the shape of a report, makes it clear that the present government is not interested in bringing out who is responsible. The king who chooses to be misled does not deserve to be the ruler," he added.

The draft report of JPC negates the findings of the official auditor, saying that Raja had changed the cutoff date for the allocation of spectrum without notice and this amounted to an irregularity.

The report further said it was a policy decision to give licences on first-come-first-served basis and not to go for auction. It noted that the move was backed by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.

It also said Finance Minister P. Chidambaram had no role in decision-making.