JODHPUR\NEW DELHI: Fresh from clinching his party's nomination for the post of president, finance minister and presidential hopeful, Pranab Mukherjee found himself in the corruption crosshairs of Team Anna. Arvind Kejriwal, Team Anna's most vociferous member, on Sunday demanded an independent probe into graft allegations against Mukherjee before elections to the country's highest office are held.
Kejriwal claimed the inquiry should be completed before the presidential elections as once Mukherjee is elected as the country's first citizen, he will enjoy immunity, which would serve as major blow to the probe.
In Jodhpur, as part of Team Anna's ``Jan Jagaran Abhiyaan'', Kejriwal made the demand while interacting with the media. ``The probe should be conducted by an independent agency, not the CBI. The post of the President is the most dignified and anybody considered for the post, should carry a clean image. Whatever be the allegations against Mukherjee, they must be probed,'' he said.
Kejriwal first referred to the 2007 scam revolving around the export of rice to Ghana when Mukherjee was the external affairs minister. ``Mukherjee's name was involved in the controversy surrounding the scam. This was a huge scam to the tune of Rs 2,000- Rs 2,500 crore, in which the then commerce minister Kamal Nath was also involved. Twenty lakh tonnes of rice was exported to a third country under the pretext of supplying it to African nations as part of hunger alleviation projects,'' said Kejriwal.
"The Ghana government itself had recommended an inquiry against Mukherjee and Kamal Nath by writing a letter to the Indian government then. But nothing happened".
Turning to the Rs 18,798-crore Scorpene submarine project, inked between India and France in 2005, when Mukherjee was the defence minister, Kejriwal alleged 4% commission was received on the deal. But Mukherjee did not order any investigation, despite voices being raised in protest, he added.
"Mukherjee is also involved in the infamous Navy war room leak scam (of mid-2005), in which three key persons were saved. But, in what can be termed as an eyewash, three Navy commanders were sacked. In this case, a pen drive carrying important strategic information had disappeared from the Navy war room and was later found with an IAF wing commander, which was shared with three persons, including Abhishek Verma (an accused in the war-room leak case) associated with the Scorpene submarine deal,'' he alleged.
Kejriwal said it was ironic that Mukherjee on one hand denied that pen drive contained any information of serious or strategic nature, whereas CBI had admitted it had information of sensitive nature. "It will be injustice to this apex post if a tainted person sits on the seat of the President", Kejriwal said, demanding an unbiased inquiry against Mukherjee.
Mukherjee, on his part, had then strongly denied in Parliament that middlemen had played any role in the Scorpene project, or that it was linked in any way to the naval war room leak case. The Scorpene project, under which six submarines are being constructed at Mazagon Docks, incidentally, has witnessed a huge cost escalation — the overall project cost now stands at Rs 23,562 crore — and is also running three years behind schedule.
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