With in hours of the Judgement on Rafale jet deal, the Congress had struck back by claiming that the BJP government “misled the apex court on the issue of Rafale deal scrutiny by the Comptroller and Auditor General”.
Not Just Principle opposition party Congress but the petitioners and various political analysts inclusive Yogendra yadav has launched staunch attack.
The point of content is the point 25 on page 21 of the Supreme Court order. It says “The pricing details [of Rafale deal] have, however, been shared with the Comptroller and Auditor General (hereinafter referred to as ‘CAG’), and the report of the CAG has been examined by the Public Accounts Committee (hereafter referred to as ‘PAC’). Only a redacted portion of the report was placed before the Parliament, and is in the public domain.”
PAC chairman Mallikarjun Kharge said that the parliamentary committee has not received any report by the CAG on the Rafale deal and there is no question of it having discussed the report. He added “Where is this report of the CAG? Show it to us if it exists. I spoke to the office of the CAG, which confirmed that its report on the Rafale deal is not yet ready.”
The Opposition has picked up this point, going on a warpath to call the verdict “flawed” and that this was due to the government “misleading the court” to believe that the pricing of the jets has already been examined by the CAG and the parliament’s PAC.
Senior Lawyer Prashant Bhushan going to the extent of saying that the verdict has “some grotesque factual errors” including “a CAG report on Rafale deal placed before the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament” which examines all CAG report.
However, the government has refuted the charge, claiming that it never “misled” the Supreme Court on the CAG report and it seems there is a “typing-error”
As per the government, the defence ministry had told SC that the “CAG is working on a report looking into the Rafale deal.”
But Government sources claim due to the typing error what was to be “the CAG report WILL BE EXAMINED BY THE PAC” became “it has been examined by the PAC”.
Sources confirmed that government on Saturday filed an application with the Supreme Court seeking to correct a “factual error” in one of the paragraphs in the documents it had submitted before the court about the CAG report on Rafale deal.
