archive: "TRY SOMETHING NEW, MADAM!"
"TRY SOMETHING NEW, MADAM!"
Editorial.
The Statesman
August 15, 1999
Title: "TRY SOMETHING NEW, MADAM!"
Author: Editorial.
Publication: The Statesman
Date: August 15, 1999
Sonia tries again to scuttle Bofors
IT seems easy to get under the skin of the Congress President and
prime ministerial hopeful, Sonia Gandhi; journalists at the press
conference to release the party manifesto did it repeatedly and
without apparent effort. She tried to make up for lack of substance by
simulated aggression and exposed herself in a manner that must have
made seasoned pros in the party worry about the coming elections. She
did not do too badly while she was offering promises of a crore of
jobs and other goodies for the asking, average politicians manage this
sort of thing well enough. But as soon as questioning turned to
Bofors, she was vicious and needlessly aggressive. She wanted lots of
"papers". She wanted the papers received from Switzerland as part of
that country's assistance in criminal matters. She has demanded before
that these be made public and she has been told before that this is a
sure way of obstructing further disclosures in the last round which is
in the final appeal stage in the Federal Court of Switzerland. She has
been given the explanation by this newspaper before but she seems to
have a very poor memory. To remind her, these documents are provided
on condition that they are used only in investigations and judicial
proceedings, any breach of this condition - and publication would be
such a breach under Swiss law - means that further disclosures will be
stopped. If this is what the lady is after, there is no reason to
oblige her.
She says that she has seen no papers to link her friend Ottavio
Quattrocchi to the payments and like her husband she insists on
"papersi. Rajiv asked on the floor of Parliament that he did not want
proof, to just tell him what was suspected and he would bring the
proof. We know what happened. The most despicable cover-up in the
country's history of criminal investigations. Let us respond to the
lady's request. Here, madam, for starters are the papers in the
Quattrochhi involvement which are publicly available; you might study
them with great profit to yourself. 1) Criminal Writ No 214, of 1998
in the Delhi High Court and 2) Special Leave Petition (Criminal) No
255 of 1999 in the Supreme Court. For ready reference, the papers
contain proof of Quattrocchi having received over $ 7,000,000 from
Bofors into his account held jointly with wife Maria, how he moved the
money around to lose the trail, how he paid it all out in four
directions, how his plea to be released from the restraint of a
red-alert notice mounted by Interpol was rejected, how he appealed to
the Supreme Court, how his Counsel said on instructions that he was
ready to come to India and be interrogated for two weeks when he would
be protected from arrest, how somebody decided in a great hurry that
the Government was to be toppled, and how on cue, Quattrocchi
repudiated his Counsel and how the Supreme Court recorded on 26 March
1999 that Their Lordships "strongly disapproved of the manner in which
the petitioner (Quattrocchi) has conducted himself in proceedings
before this court.i How Quattrocchi was prompted to get out of his
commitment to the Supreme Court to come to India, the lady may well
know first hand.
Sonia Gandhi undertook that her party "would take the Bofors
investigation to its logical conclusion: The logical direction in
which her collaborators, Quattrocchi and the Hinduja brothers have
taken the matter is to obstruct the disclosure of the bank documents
in the Swiss courts, to the extent that the Swiss have changed their
procedures for the future on purpose to prevent a recurrence, to
interfere with local investigations, to prevent prosecution of named
officials as requested by the CBI and to dispense with the services of
our respected lawyer in Geneva, Mr Marc Bonnant, by sending him an
insulting letter signed by a junior official of the CBI.
Try something new for a change, Madam!
Back
Top
|
