The controversial affidavit filed by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) in the Supreme Court, which said that all decisions taken on new Unified Access Service (UAS) licences and on other related issues taken by the ministry under A Raja had the concurrence of the Prime Minister might have netted its first victim.
The affidavit resulted in the Prime Minister?s name being ?unnecessarily? dragged into the 2G spectrum mess in the Supreme Court.
On Tuesday, the law ministry is learnt to have decided to immediately recall its law officer from the DoT and post a new one. While senior officials refused to confirm or deny the move and whether the sudden transfer ? the officer in question, DoT legal adviser Dr Santokh Singh, has just a few months left for superannuation ? was connected to the faux pas that caused ripples in the country?s politics, sources said the transfer has been ordered precisely for this reason.
As reported earlier, Singh also notoriously moved a note from the DoT to the law ministry stating that the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) had no business to question policy decisions of the government. The note was moved when CAG had asked DoT to respond to the irregularities found by it in the award of the 2G licences in 2008. Singh had acted on the brief of another controversial officer, DDG-access services in the DoT, AK Srivastava.
Sources said while the affidavit was cleared by solicitor-general Gopal Subramanium, who is the counsel for DoT in the PIL filed by Janata Party leader Subramanian Swamy seeking sanction for launching prosecution proceedings against Raja and other allegedly involved in the scam, the DoT legal adviser didn?t raise a red flag.
Miffed with the officer?s failure to prevent the faux pas, law minister M Veerappa Moily is learnt to have ordered the immediate repatriation of Singh, who is posted in DoT since July 2005. Sources said a joint secretary-rank officer will be deputed to DoT soon.
Singh was the legal advisor during the 2G and 3G spectrum allocation and the law ministry as well as the post-Raja dispensation in DoT is keen to scrutinise his role in the matter.
What has upset the top echelons of the government, including the PMO, is the fact that the DoT affidavit cites a letter written by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on November 2, 2007 as well as Raja?s reply the same day as proof of Raja?s bona fide.
?Thus, not only was there no difference of opinion with Hon?ble Prime Minister, he was also fully kept informed at all decisions. On 26.12.2007, Hon?ble MoCIT again wrote a letter to the Prime Minister, informing that it is proposed to implement the decision without further delay and without any departure from the existing guidelines,? says the affidavit.
However, senior PMO officials have pointed out that while the first letter from the PM to Raja asked him to adopt a transparent procedure and also raised many queries, a second letter from the PM was a simple acknowledgment of another letter sent by Raja.
After protests by the government that the opposition was dragging the PM?s name in the scam, the opposition parties pointed to the fact that it was not the opposition, but the DoT, which had dragged the PM?s name in the 2G scam.