The Enforcement Directorate has slapped money laundering charges in several cases of irregularities in connection with the decision related to Air India during the UPA regime. The move comes in the wake of CBI FIRs against Air India and other Government officials of that period. The controversial decisions include aircraft purchases by Air India and its merger with Indian Airlines.
The CBI FIRs detailed the “illegalities and violations” and loss to the exchequer due to the controversial decisions taken by the Finance Ministry and the Civil Aviation Ministry during the regime of P Chidambaram and Praful Patel. Two cases are related to the controversial merger of Air India and Indian Airlines and alleged irregularities in the purchase and leasing of aircraft by the two State-run carriers under the UPA Government which caused “huge” losses to the exchequer, according to the CBI.
Earlier, the CAG had detailed the loss to exchequer due to the big purchase of flights for Air India and some of which were sold to private airlines at cheap rates.
The other two cases relate to surrender of profitable routes and timings of Air India to favour national and international private players which allegedly caused a “huge” loss to the State-run carrier and alleged wrongdoing in the purchase of software for the airline. It is expected that the ED will soon issue summons to a few officials and others involved, asking them to appear before it.
The CBI had registered cases against unidentified officials of Air India, Ministry of Civil Aviation and others on charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating and corruption. While registering the cases, the CBI had last year said that these instances “relate to decisions taken by the ministry during the UPA tenure which caused losses of tens of thousands of crore of rupees to the exchequer.”
The allegations relate to the purchase of 111 aircraft, costing about Rs 70,000 crore, for the national airlines to benefit foreign aircraft manufacturers. “Such a purchase caused an alleged financial loss to the already stressed national carriers,” the CBI had alleged.
The CAG had in 2011 questioned the rationale behind the Government’s decision to order 111 airplanes from Airbus and Boeing for AI and Indian Airlines for about Rs 70,000 crore in 2006.
Calling the decision a “recipe for disaster”, the Government auditor had said it should have raised “alarm” in the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Public Investment Board and the Planning Commission.
The other case pertains to leasing of a large number of aircraft without due consideration, proper route study and marketing or price strategy, the CBI had said. “It was also alleged that the aircraft were leased even while aircraft acquisition programme was going on,” it said.
Another case involves allegations of surrender of profitable routes and timings of Air India to favour national and international private players which allegedly caused a “huge” loss to the State-run carrier.
The last CBI case was filed against unknown officials of Air India, German firm SAP AG and global computer major IBM in connection with alleged irregularities in the procurement of software worth Rs 225 crore by the national carrier in 2011. This case was filed by the CBI on the recommendation of the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) which found prima facie procedural irregularities took place in the procurement of the software.
