Tuesday, April 5 2005 17:18 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government has given a clean chit to former Defence Minister George Fernandes in the procurement done during the Kargil conflict.

In an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court, it has said there was no violation of any financial rules of the Government or the Defence Procurement Procedures, 1992.

The Centre said that the modified procedures issued on June 21, 1999 were not to substitute or supersede the prescribed procedures for normal procurement action.

The modified procedures were meant only to "telescope" the time frame, particularly for imports, that has become critical keeping in view the intensity of "Operation Vijay" and unpredictability of the situation on the period for which the operation would last, it said.

In the affidavit the Government said that the measures taken to abridge the time frame related to simplification of terms of contract and simplification of procedure.

In the simplification procedure, provisions were made to make Price Negotiation Committee (PNC) reports more comprehensive, approval for the release of foreign exchange together with expenditure, clearance and a closer monitoring of contract signed, the Centre said.

"These in no way violated any of the financial rules of the Government or the Defence Procurement Procedures, 1992."

The Supreme Court had issued notice to the Centre to explain what steps it had taken after the report of Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) referred to irregularities in the purchase of arms and ammunition and other materials during and after the Kargil war in July 1999.

The Apex Court had issued notice only to the Centre even though the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) had made former Defence Minister George Fernandes party while alleging that the irregularities in the Kargil scam caused a loss of Rs 2,175 crore to the national exchequer.

The Bench had earlier referred the PIL filed by K G Dhananjay Chauhan to Attorney General Milon Banerjee and who had told the court that the relevant papers have been scrutinised by his junior and nothing substantial has been found.

But the Apex Court had asked the AG to file an additional affidavit.

He said that it appeared from the CAG report that almost double the amount of the price of the ammunition was paid and wanted to know as to why the Government did not let the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament to go through the "secret" report of Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) on this issue.

In the affidavit the Centre had said the PNC report on review of procurement for operation Vijaya (Army) was presented to Parliament on August 6, 2003.

The committee had expressed their inability to give the findings from the CAG report on the ground that the ministry had not supplied the CVC report.