CAG report not final word: Mukherjee

"Loss figure calculated only in hindsight"

trithesh

Trithesh Nandan | November 19, 2010



Saving prime minister Manmohan Singh from the opposition attack, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said that the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) report was not the final word on the 2G spectrum sale.

“It is now being examined by the public accounts committee (PAC). It was the CAG’s job is to point out the financial irregularity. I am not raising any doubts about their bona fide, they have done good job, they have done their mandated jobs but that is not the end of it," Mukherjee was replying to the questions asked in the Hindustan Times Summit in New Delhi.

The finance minister added that the CAG report will have to be reexamined by the PAC, further evidences will be called for and after that when the report will come that will be the final report.

On the Rs 1.76 lakh crore loss figure cited by the CAG in its report, Mukherjee said, “This type of calculation is made in the hindsight. I don’t know from where this valuation has come, but I am not challenging it.”

Parliament was adjourned till Monday as the opposition members continued to demand a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into the 2G scam. They have been demanding JPC after the report of the CAG came out in public. “We want JPC,” the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP) members shouted in the Lok Sabha.

Mukherjee also spoke about the corruption and said it was matter of concern in India. “The corruption in the economy was a matter of concern, adding that he was unsure about the actual amount of black money in the economy,” commenting on the report released by the Global Financial Integrity (GFI) released on Wednesday which said from 1948 to now, graft has cost India $462 bn (about Rs 20.8 trillion).

“The finance ministry is examining this report and the methodology of it how it has come to this conclusion. We will take active measures after that,” Mukherjee told the gathering.

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