Even as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh defended home minister P Chidambaram after the note on 2G spectrum allocation written by the finance ministry to the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) came out in the open, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) advised the Prime Minister not to defend Chidambaram as he had defended former telecom minister A Raja.
Senior BJP leaders believe finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had repeatedly cautioned Prime Minister Manmohan Singh by writing letters, first in December 2007 and in March 2011, about irregularities in the 2G spectrum allocation, but Singh continued to be confident about the integrity of Chidambaram.
“To defend A Raja was the compulsion of a coalition, but we want to know what is the Prime Minister’s compulsion to defend home minister P Chidambaram? Is the Prime Minister trying to defend P Chidambaram so that the allegations in the 2G spectrum allocation scam don’t reach the doorsteps of the PMO?” questioned BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad.
