Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) descended into chaos on Thursday after the UPA managed to secure the support of BSP and SP to obtain a surprising majority which "rejected" the draft report on the 2G scam that was sharply critical of Prime Minister, his office and others.

Seven Congress MPs, supported by two from DMK, attacked the Chairman of the 21-member committee and veteran BJP leader M M Joshi over leakage of the report prepared by him which had made headlines.

The draft report had criticised Prime Minister Manmohan Singh personally for his "desire" to keep the PMO at "arm's length" on the issue of 2G allocation that allowed the then Telecom Minister A Raja to execute his "dubious designs" and was also critical of the then Finance Minister P Chidambaram and officials of the PMO with regard to handling the scam.

Earlier report:

Eleven MPs, including one each from SP and BSP, today demanded rejection of the draft Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report on the 2G scam which has indicted former telecom minister A Raja and made critical observations about prime minister Manmohan Singh and the then finance minister P Chidambaram.

At the meeting of the 21-member committee, convened to discuss the draft report, nine members belonging to the ruling UPA -- seven Congress, two DMK -- and one each from SP and BSP opposed its adoption, committee sources said.

They said the members spoke their views and gave in writing to chairman Murli Manohar Joshi that the draft report be rejected.

After three hours of deliberations, Joshi found the going tough and adjourned the proceedings till 4 PM when the issue may be put to vote.

An all out political war has broken out with the draft PAC report coming down heavily on the PMO, Cabinet Secretariat and faulting the Prime Minister in the 2G scam.

Congress and DMK have hit back demanding Joshi's resignation.

Riled by critical comments against prime minister Manmohan Singh, the ruling coalition accused Joshi, a veteran BJP leader, of having "malafide intentions" to destabilise the government after he circulated a draft report of the committee which criticised the PMO and cabinet secretariat for not taking "corrective action".

With the strength of the two sides delicately balanced in the 21-member committee, the role of Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party, which have a member each on the PAC, will be important.

The PAC has seven representatives from the Congress, four from BJP, two each from AIADMK and DMK, and one each from Shiv Sena, BJD, JD(U), SP, BSP and CPI(M).

Joshi is keen on pushing the report before the term of the current Committee ends on Saturday. But the ruling coalition members are expected to stall the report by seeking further discussion and calling more witnesses, including former Telecom Minister A Raja in a bid to prolong the process.

The draft report also attacked the then Finance Minister P Chidambaram for recommending to the Prime Minister to "treat the matter as closed" instead of taking action against those responsible for loss to the exchequer.

The voluminous report had some unpleasant words for Singh, who had kept his office at "arm's length" in 2G spectrum issue which helped Raja "to execute his unfair, arbitrary and dubious designs".

The report says the Prime Minister on January three, 2008 wanting to keep the PMO at "arm's length" seemed to have given an "indirect green signal" to Raja to go ahead and "execute his unfair, arbitrary and dubious designs".

The controversial distribution of licences and spectrum was taken by the DMK representative in the Cabinet on January 10, 2008, which the CAG had estimated a presumptive revenue loss of over Rs 1.76 lakh crore.

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BJP backs Joshi, accuses govt of stalling 2G probe

Standing firmly behind PAC chairperson Murli Manohar Joshi against the onslaught by Congress and DMK members, the BJP on Thursday alleged that these were "calculated, deliberate and sponsored" attacks by the ruling coalition to stall the investigation into 2G scam.

"The BJP strongly condemns the attacks on the PAC chairperson. These are calculated, deliberate, concerted and sponsored attacks," BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said.

Joshi had faced stiff opposition from Congress and DMK members in the PAC meeting on Thursday, when they alleged that he was trying to destabilise the government. They opposed the draft report and said it had been outsourced.

Supporting its senior leader and former president against these barbs, the BJP alleged that when the probe reached the top levels of power like PMO and finance minister this "sponsored campaign" started.

"There is a design behind this attack," Prasad said, adding that the attempt was to forestall the report.

"Prime minister Manmohan Singh had earlier said Joshi is a seasoned politician and a senior parliamentarian. He had also offered to appear before the PAC. The Congress members had also praised the PAC earlier," Prasad said.

He recalled that during the April 4 meeting of the PAC, the panel had unanimously decided that it should submit its report on 2G spectrum issue by April 30.

The BJP objected to the manner in which some Congress members of PAC commented in the press against Joshi.

"We want to ask the Congress a question that when the prime minister had praised Joshi how has he now been painted as a villian?" Prasad said.

The main opposition also charged the UPA government with attacking government institutions one by one.

"First Kapil Sibal attacked the CAG, then the others also attacked him. Then came the appointment of a person (with a tainted record) as CVC. Now a Parliamentary committee is being attacked," Prasad said.

The Rajya Sabha MP alleged that parliamentary affairs minister P K Bansal had visited some PAC members from other parties to influence them.

"The government does not want the PAC report. It had no objection when industrialists or editors were called. The whole hungama started when officials from the PMO and the attorney general were called," Prasad alleged.

"Regardless of repeated rebuffs from the media and the judiciary, the government has shown dogged determination to stall a fair investigation (into 2G scam)," Prasad said.

PAC indicts P Chidamdaram,  Pranab Mukherkjee

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's offer to present himself for questioning appeared to have weighed in Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) giving him a clean chit in its draft report while indicting arrested former telecom minister A Raja and seeking re-tendering of the 2G licences he had given for a song, causing a loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crores to the exchequer.

The report recommends that all 2G licences issued by Raja be scrapped and the existing licensees who benefited illegally by his decisions be imposed heavy penalty. It says these steps will not impinge upon the judicial set into motion for punishing the guilty.

The draft, dictated by the BJP's veteran leader Murli Manohar Joshi as the PAC chairman, has come as a major embarrassment to his party that has been agitating inside and outside Parliament for the Prime Minister's resignation over the 2G scam. The BJP leaders like former union minister Yashwant Sinha who is a PAC member squirmed at Dr Joshi saying PM is not to be blamed for the scam.

Dr Joshi has, however, insisted in his draft that the scam was result of the arbitrary actions of Raja who even misled Dr Singh and as such the PM cannot be blamed who offered himself for questioning and made the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) provide every document the PAC sought to facilitate its probe.

The 270-page draft, leaked within hours of the PAC's 22 members getting it for the final meeting on Thursday, also comes down heavily on then Finance Minister P Chidambaram for writing to the PM to treat the matter closed despite acknowledging that spectrum is a scarce resource and the price of spectrum should be based on its scarcity value and efficiency of usage.

It wants the matter probed in its entirety on the unusual act of Chidambaram who should have initiated "stringent and swift action against all those responsible for the whopping losses to the exchequer"  as the guardian of the public exchequer and entrusted with the principal task of mobilisation of resources for public welfare.

The draft also squarely blames PMO for letting Raja award spectrum and licences for mobile telephony by not presenting his communication to Dr Singh in time and not placing the matter before the Union Cabinet despite differences among ministers.

The licences were already issued by the time the file was put up before the Prime Minister and hence he could not do anything on the justification given by Raja for adopting the first-come-first served principle to favour a selected few.

Dr Joshi's draft concludes that the PM was not kept in the loop by his own office as he would have stepped in to stop the licences but for the delay in getting the information. It says Raja took undue advantage of the delay in rushing with allotment of the licences by the time the fact was presented to the Prime Minister.

The draft, that ought to get the stamp of the PAC as the final report because of the Opposition's majority, accepts the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) figure of Rs 1.76 lakh crore loss to the national exchequer in the faulty allocation process. The PAC examined the CAG report paragraph by paragraph.

It also recommends that the future licences should be rolled out through the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), though there may be differences on this since the authority is supposed to regulate and cannot usurp the implementation powers of the Department of Telecommunication.

The draft also refers to some of the tapes of phone conversations of lobbyist Niira Radia who was summoned to appear before the PAC on the same day top industrialist Ratan Tata was called. It says: "The Radia tapes reveal the tip of the iceberg and provide glimpses of the often unreported backroom deals, shady trade offs, role of middlemen, quid pro quos between lobbyists and certain journalists, insatiable greed for wealth etc."

Dr Joshi has also cast aspersions on Ratan Tata for the letter he sent to DMK supremo M Karunanidhi through Radia, praising work done by his party's nominee A Raja in the Union Ministry.

The Congress and DMK members are up in arms over Dr Joshi circulating the draft report, ignoring their protests that the PAC has still not examined all aspects of the 2G scam and as such the probe cannot be wound up with the findings he wants to slam down their throats.

They are left with no option but to write their dissent notes, though a Congress member on the PAC said the meeting slated on Thursday will be stormy as every effort will be made to scuttle finalisation of the report.

Dr Joshi has, however, affirmed in the covering letter of the draft report that the PAC's work can not be extended beyond its term that ends on April 30 and sending it to the next PAC to be constituted would only amount to examining the issues de novo. He cited Rule 311(2) of the Rules of Procedures and Conduct of Business of Lok Sabha that does not permit a PAC to continue beyond its one-year term.

He has also stressed that the PAC works under a constitutional mandate and as such its probe into the 2G scam cannot be abandoned without a report, just because the House has constituted a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for the probe in its last session. He also referred to Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar ruling that the role of PAC cannot be diluted even though the JPC's inquiry into the same issue is on.

Sources said Dr Joshi could have carried over the 2G scam probe to the next PAC since he is bound to be its chairman again as the practice goes. He, however, did not want to take a chance since it is a prerogative of the Speaker to name the chairman.

Moreover, he did not expect any further progress from the way the ruling members had completely blocked further proceedings since early this month on the pretext of duplication of work already being done by the JPC and not allowing the questioning of some of the officials who were issued notices only with their consent.

The Congress and DMK members first prevented deposition of Attorney General Goolam Vahanvati, Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar and PM's principal secretary TKA Nair and then insisted that the PAC probe would be incomplete unless all those nabbed by the CBI are also interrogated.

The DMK, however, had own misgivings when the Congress members last week pressed for summoning Raja on the ground that he is the main "hero" of the whole scandal and the PAC probe would remain incomplete without probing him. Dr Joshi, however, rejected the demand on the ground that the PAC was left with no time to summon anybody and particularly Raja who is in the judicial custody and will take long time to get him before the committee.

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Govt dismissive of PAC draft report

Incensed by the leak of a draft report of Public Accounts Committee prepared by Chairman M M Joshi, the government today was dismissive about it and targeted him, saying he was acting as a BJP member rather than the chief of the Parliamentary panel.

"This is not a report of PAC but that of Joshi...One should understand the difference. The PAC is meeting tomorrow," a senior minister said when asked to react to the report which has raised questions on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and criticised P Chidambaram in his previous portfolio as Finance Minister.

Another minister said Joshi "has been acting like a BJP member rather than the Chairman of PAC.

2G scam: ED to attach properties of errant telecos

The Enforcement Directorate today told the Supreme Court that property worth Rs 2,000 crore each will be attached against two companies which are involved in the 2G spectrum scam during the tenure of former telecom minister A Raja.

"Property worth Rs 2,000 crore has to be attached relating to these companies," senior advocate K K Venugopal, appearing for the ED, submitted before a bench comprising justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly.

Venugopal, who was reading the excerpts of the fresh status report of the ED submitted in a sealed cover, did not mention the names of the company but assured that attachment proceedings will be initiated soon and will be completed within two months.