JPC demand unreasonable, says Sibal
Rejecting the demand for a JPC probe into the allocation of 2G spectrum as unreasonable, telecom minister Kapil Sibal on Sunday said such a process would not help achieve the objective “sought to be served” and alleged the Opposition’s motive was “pure politics”.
The government is not averse to a Supreme Court-monitored probe, but does not want any executive authority to intervene, to ensure that the process is transparent and has the confidence of the people, Mr Sibal said. He said the government has initiated action to see if ineligible firms were given licences and as far as criminal culpability is concerned, the matter was being investigated.
“Criminal culpability is being investigated by the CBI and we are not averse to Supreme Court’s monitoring and ideally we don’t want any executive authority in between, so that the process is transparent and the public is confident that it is directly being investigated by the top court and JPC cannot do anything better than that,” Mr Sibal said. A JPC should emerge through a consensus or when there is a cause of national concern, the minister said, adding that the Opposition’s demand “is something to do with pure politics”.
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K’taka Gov: Ministers not listening to me
Age Correspondent
Bengaluru
Dec. 5: Karnataka governor H.R. Bhardwaj, on Sunday, took strong exception to the state government’s decision to order a judicial probe into alleged land scams instead of turning them over to the Lokayukta. Mr Bhardwaj said that since the Lokayukta was investigating the issue, it will unearth the truth. It may be recalled that the Lokayukta justice Santosh Hegde, too, had objected to the state government ordering a judicial probe headed by a retired high court judge when the matter was pending before him.
Asked about the scams which led to the resignation of state housing minister Katta Subramanya Naidu, he said, “I don’t want to react about what is happening. Ministers are also not listening to my advice. When I raised the illegal mining issue, there was criticism that I was misusing my position. I will leave it to the people to judge.”
He said that he was watching all developments and sending monthly reports to the President of India, under the law. “What can anyone do? When I gave them fair advice, they just did not care about it. Even some people in the government tried their best to get me evicted from this post. Therefore let them do what they like and I will do my job of sending reports to the President as long as I am the governor of this state,” he said.
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