Wednesday, December 01, 2010

Hopeless Telecom Minister - Hapless UPA Government

Indian political and economical structures have been trembling with scams from past few years i.e. IPL, Commonwealth games, Adarsh housing and 2G Telecom. A bunch of corruption scams have been popping up in the country as a part of global economic reforms and development. The culprits for these organized corruptions are mostly politicians, bureaucrats and corporates. The biggest financial and economic crime in India till date is 2G spectrum (Rs.1.76-lakh crore scandal) which was reported by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). The allegation on Ministry of Telecom is that the allotments of 2G spectrum licenses were not justifiable. The former telecom minister A. Raja misused his authority in issuing the 2G licenses to the telecom operators with very minor fee and without transparent method of auction which has caused huge revenue loss to the Indian exchequer.

India has huge telecom market in the world i.e. more than 650 millions of telephone connections. In 2008, the Telecom Ministry issued airwave licenses to some telecom companies for second generation (2G) mobile phone services at Rs1,658 crore for a pan-India (Presence Across Nation) operation in the controversial manner without calling for competitive bids. Later, the auction of airwaves for third generation (3G) services, which got nearly Rs. 63,000 crores and that for broadband access, which fetched over Rs. 35,700 crores. Finally, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India reported that the allocation of 2G spectrum was undertaken in an arbitrary manner and the estimated loss to the exchequer due to under pricing of 2G spectrum was Rs. 160,000 crores.

Everybody used to chant the honesty, nobility, credibility and good governance of Mr. Man Mohan sing, but his clean image got diminished when he was trying to give clean chit to A.Raja. Few months ago, Mr. Man Mohan sing was agonized on crony capitalism in the press meet. If Prime minister wants to act against crony capitalism, then why can’t he sack the scandalous minister whenever the scam confirmed? Why UPA chairperson Ms. Sonia has not taken quick action on Raja scam, as she took the fast decision on Maharashtra chief minister dismissal on Adarsh housing society corruption. The UPA government is reluctant to set off Joint parliamentary committee (JPC) probe on 2G spectrum scam. All these tricks on 2g scam seem to be suspicious that Congress party also has its share in this dirty money conspiracy.

The worst thing is that the supreme court of India has doubted about the UPA government legitimacy and asked the government to produce an affidavit to explain why the Prime minister did not act on CAG report. Ironically, Mr. Raja got re-appointed as a Union telecom minister by the UPA-2 government despite the financial crime committed by him in 2008. Recently the CBI revealed the tapes of Nira radia (Corporate PR consultant- http://www.vccpl.com/ ), how she lobbied to reappoint the culprit Raja as a cabinet minister in UPA-2 government. These tapes clearly indicate that how the lobbyists and corporates (Sunil Mittal – Anil) are organize the governments.
Click for RAJA – RADIA Tapes: http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?268064

However, Mr. Man Mohan and Ms. Sonia are both together have to take the responsibility on this scam. The solution is not simply replacing or dismissal of the minister. The prim minister has to initiate the prosecution on Raja and the money has to be recovered from the culprits and the licenses should be void. Being a UPA Chairperson Ms. Sonia should not suppose to spare dishonest ministers and the coalition partners for simply to remain in power. She has to look for substitute alliance party to get the support for the stable alliance government. Of course, these are all coalition politics.

I used to read about the scams on natural resources like lands, Mines, forests and rivers and now the trend is AIR. I mean that Airwaves also part of the natural resources.

Please do comment :YashwanthX@yahoo.com