'BJP does not have the grace to admit they did a U-turn'

NDTV: Arun Jaitley in an interview said to me the Congress and the media had got his initial statements wrong. He said he is going to disclose all the names. However, he said names will be disclosed to court. He said he has a basic agreement with Swiss authorities that once independent investigations have been done in India, there will be co-operation and he said expect big Congress names... How do you respond to Jaitley's comments?

P Chidambaram: Firstly, no one got it wrong. The affidavit filed in the Supreme Court clearly was a U-turn on the position that the BJP had taken. When we had told the court that under the bilateral agreements we cannot and should not be asked to disclose the names until charges are filed or prosecution is launched, the BJP criticised us. In fact, I remember a statement by Narendra Modi on February 17, where he said the finance minister is paying lip service to the cause and that when he comes to power they will disclose the names and they will bring back the black money in 100 days. So nobody got the BJP wrong. The BJP does not have the grace to admit that they did a U-turn, but that's for the people to judge.

NDTV: But Jaitley is saying he will disclose the names, so how is it a U-turn?

P Chidambaram: It's no change in the position of the UPA, we also said we will disclose the names once prosecution is filed or once charges are framed. That's the position they criticised. Now they are adopting the same position. Apart from it being a right position in law, they should not have criticised the position that we had taken.

NDTV: So you are supporting the position they have taken saying they have no choice but to take this position?

P Chidambaram: I'm not supporting the position, I'm only saying it is the only right position that you can take if you don't want to jeopardise your bilateral treaties. But whether the Supreme Court will accept it we don't know. They didn't accept it when we said it, we'll see if they'll accept it when the BJP government says it.

NDTV: Two things. One, Jaitley says all of you have got it wrong because we are going to disclose the names to court shortly. In the several years that the names were with you, you did not disclose them to court. You did not disclose any names?

P Chidambaram: Wrong again. We disclosed 18 names to the Supreme Court and it asked us to give those names to (Ram) Jethmalani and those names were given to Jethmalani. Those were the only cases where prosecution or charges have been launched.

NDTV: You are saying the BJP position today is identical to the position you took when you were in government?

P Chidambaram: Yes

NDTV: But there is one difference and that difference is that the finance ministry today is saying we had some progress with the Swiss authorities…

P Chidambaram: Who started that process? I started the process.

NDTV: But you didn't get progress

P Chidambaram: No, no we did, we pushed them to a point after several very strong letters, that if you don't share the information, we are going to raise it in the G20. I raised it in the G20, the G20 Final Declaration had a paragraph on sharing information and it was specifically directed towards Switzerland and similar tax havens. In fact, the Swiss, who usually attend the Summit by invitation, conveniently absented themselves in the last meeting.

Be that as it may. So we pushed them to a point where they finally said all right, we will either disclose the names where you've had independent evidence gathered or we will tell you the reasons why we cannot disclose the names. Now the agreement that they've entered into 10 days ago, when the revenue secretary visited Switzerland, is exactly that: we will disclose the names if there is independent evidence gathered by India or we will tell you the reasons why we cannot disclose the names.

NDTV: So you're saying that you question the fact that there has been greater movement on the black money issue under the BJP? There's been an SIT (special investigation team) formed... Hasn't the government shown more responsiveness, more alacrity on the issue than your government?

P Chidambaram: I don't think so. The order on forming an SIT, I think, if I remember it right, was passed by the court on the May 1 and I had said to my officers that this decision must be left to the next government after the election. So it so happened that the BJP came to office and they formed the SIT.

NDTV: But the formal agreement between the revenue secretary and Swiss authorities announced, as you said 10 days ago in Berne, would you say that you managed to obtain a similar agreement in writing, officially?

P Chidambaram: That's what I'm trying to say, the formal writing is not there.

NDTV: So you had a de facto understanding but they have a formal agreement?

P Chidambaram: We pushed to a point where they said "Yes, we will enter into such an agreement"... I could not (go public) because there was an election, there was a change of government, those 2-3 months there was no delegation visiting Switzerland.

NDTV: So you had a private understanding that you could not reveal to the public.

P Chidambaram: Not a private understanding but our negotiations and the pressure that we built through G20 brought the Swiss to a point where they said yes this is the understanding we will reach, and we will enter into an agreement.

NDTV: You have not seen the names?

P Chidambaram: I did not ask to see nor was I shown the names...

Edited excerpts from an interview with former Finance Minister P Chidambaram by Barkha Dutt of NDTV, New Delhi, October 24, 2014.
Printed with permission from NDTV