In Chopper Gate, Main Indian Conspirators will Walk Away Bruised

Corruption in defence procurement is too entrenched for the Modi government to root out fully, writes Amar Bhushan.

(Photo: The Quint)

The AgustaWestland helicopter deal has returned to haunt both Houses of Parliament, following the Italian High Court’s judgement in which Congress leaders have been mentioned adversely. The BJP has produced an array of documents that supposedly expose the Congress leaders’ complicity in receiving kickbacks.

The Congress, on the other hand, has dared the BJP to file charges in court against Sonia Gandhi and Ahmed Patel. Sticking close to their recent fondness for the Congress, the JDU, the CPI, the CPI(M), the BSP and the SP have sought an independent inquiry to punish the guilty. Basically, the opposition argument to the Narendra Modi government is that you raked up the pay-offs issue and therefore it is your responsibility to identify the thieves and prosecute them.

These acrimonious exchanges are actually meaningless.

No inquiry conducted by the CBI, SIT or a Supreme Court judge will ever be able to link the suspects directly to the bribe. For that, you need video/audio recording of the ‘event’ and documentary proof such as receipts which no ‘veteran’ will ever oblige you with.

At best, you can raise reasonable doubts and fish out procedural irregularities and mala fide intent of those who officially handled the deal, but nothing beyond this. The principal conspirators may walk away bruised but not battered for they work behind several firewalls.

Loot in Defence Deals

Ever since Independence, our defence deals have been the proverbial ‘Kamdhenu’ which you can milk as much as you want. Without exception, officers of the defence forces and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and politicians manning the ministry who handle procurement have been direct or indirect beneficiaries of the loot. It is actually difficult to think of any deal since the days of Jawaharlal Nehru that would have gone through cleanly. We could only wish that the Modi government could commission an inquiry into all defence deals during the past 60 years. The findings will surely shame the nation.

The loot has been primarily possible because we are told to believe that questioning the procurement process will adversely affect the morale of the defence forces and their performance on the battlefield. As a result, payoffs are quietly passed on to facilitators at all levels who are not concerned how the rigged deals would affect the quality of our fighting machine and undermine national security. It is no secret that successive defence ministers have purloined from the defence budget, some for expanding their financial empires and others for filling their party’s coffers.

NDA activists display placards at a protest over the AgustaWestland scam during the on-going Parliament session in New Delhi, May 6, 2016. (Photo: PTI)

Defence Deal Rip-offs

• While AgustaWestland scam highlights corruption in defence deals, absence of documentary proof brings to attention the probe agencies’ haplessness.
  
• Kickbacks in defence deals has become a usual phenomenon with procurement process which has not been streamlined even after sixty years of Independence.
  
• Corruption at every hierarchical level of defence procurement ensures that the rigged deals sail through clerical roadblocks.
  
• Role of defence secretaries need to be scrutinised as they act as a bridge between the ministry and service chiefs and are often gifted with constitutional posts after retirement.
  

Red Tape Runs Through Hierarchy

Who does one blame for this sorry state of affairs? Politicians, of course, top the list for they take the final call on awarding the deal. Then you have military officers who provide the technical requirement and are notorious for tweaking specifications to suit the vendors in lieu of pay-offs. This is not possible unless the instruction to tailor the specification comes from the chiefs of the respective services. Next you have MoD bureaucrats who ensure that the rigged deals sail through, unhampered by clerical roadblocks.

The defence secretaries, however, are the worst culprits who work as the interface between the minister and the service chiefs and are supposed to scrutinise the proposals objectively and record their opinion. In practice, they do just the opposite. They broadly fall in two categories. The first are those who share the loot with the minister and defence officers and amass enough for their families to live comfortably. Then there are those who facilitate the deal but themselves steer clear of it. They usually end up occupying constitutional posts after retirement in lieu of services rendered to their political masters.

If my memory serves right, no defence secretary has ever been dumped for opposing deals on files. I am aware of cases of several upright officers who dissented but they were too junior, and when they persisted they were either shifted or repatriated.

The trait of spinelessness is not the preserve of defence secretaries alone.  Chiefs of the Enforcement Directorate, the CBI and the Central Vigilance Commission have repeatedly shown that they are also willing to bend. Similarly, for every department and agency of the central government involved in procuring military equipment from abroad, kickback is a given. The malaise is very deep and it is unlikely that the Modi government can go beyond touching the tip of the iceberg and materially change the old habit of acquiring and distributing loot and patronage.

(The writer is a former Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat)

Also read:

How Accurate Are Manohar Parrikar’s AgustaWestland Claims?

In Pursuit of the ‘Invisible Hand’ in Choppergate