No more smoking gun: Quattrocchi dies ‘peacefully’

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New Delhi: Cont­r­o­versial Italian businessman Ottavio Quatt­r­occhi, a key figure in the Bofors payoffs scandal, has died in Milan following a stroke.
 
The 74-year-old Quattr­o­cchi died 'peacefully' on Friday and his funeral will take place on Monday, a member of the family told PTI on phone from the Italian city.
 
The Bofors chargesheet filed in 1999 by the CBI had named Quattrocchi, who was close to the Gandhi family during his days in India as the representative of an Italian firm, as one of the accused in the case regarding the Rs 64 crore payoffs for supply of Swedish howitzer guns to the  Army. The Rs 1,600-crore contract was clinched in 1986.
 
On March 4, 2011, a Tis Hazari court discharged Quattrocchi from the payoffs case after allowing the CBI to withdraw the prosecution case against him, bringing to an end a major chapter in the 25-year-old Bofors saga. An application for withdrawal of the case against Quattrocchi was filed by the public prosecutor on October 3, 2009.
 
The CBI had unsuccessfully tried to get Quattr­oc­chi extradited to India, but lost two extradition appeals, first in Malaysia in 2002, and then in Arg­entina in 2007. Quattrochi left India in 1993 to apparently avoid being arrested.
 
Defence minister A.K. Antony recently said the government does not plan to launch any fresh probe into the Bofors scandal and that Quattrocchi stands 'discharged' as he could not be extradited even after 20 years of registration of the case.

 
Quattrocchi a ‘ghost’ created by BJP: Congress
 
Cong slams oppn for dragging Ottavio’s name to ‘besmirch’ Gandhi family
 

Congress on Saturday said Italian businessman Otta­vio Quattrocchi was a 'ghost' created by BJP and slammed the opposition for seeking to drag his name to 'besmirch' the party and the Gandhi family. 
 
Party leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi said Quattrocchi was a “ghost” created by BJP and that charges against him had been quashed during NDA rule. “I don’t understand why Congress should react to the death of somebody who has been a ghost created by BJP. Somebody has died, his family deserves condolences,” he told a private news channel. 
 
The Italian businessman who was wanted in India in connection with the Bofors payoff scandal, died today in Milan, Italy. 
 
Singhvi said it was in 2004 during BJP-led rule that the Delhi High Court had quashed the charges against Quattrocchi and the government of the day had not filed any appleal against that ruling.
 
"...from 1998 to 2004, BJP tried to tom tom this thing during elections and lost this issue in at least three or four elections. They were unable to do anything to prove complicity in this crime," he said. “But as far as besmirching of the political system is concerned...of the Gandhi family, of Congress is concerned, this is very wrong,” he added. 
 
BJP leader Prakash Javadekar, however, dismissed Singhvi's charges saying the ghost was created because Congress was “hosting” him. “...the ghost was not created by BJP but by V.P. Singh and if we had created the ghost, it is because you were hosting it,” he said reacting to Quattrocchi's death.