Congress stands by Chidambaram, says it has full faith in his integrity

NEW DELHI: Congress threw its weight behind Home Minister P Chidambaram, rejecting allegations made against him by Janata Party President Subramanian Swamy and others, saying that it had full faith in the home minister’s integrity.

“It is highly objectionable that in a matter that is actively sub-judice and in which Swamy is seeking exactly the same order from the Supreme Court, he chooses to pass a premature judgement,” Congress spokesman Abhishek Singhvi said adding that it amounted to sensationalisation of the court proceedings.

The Congress blamed the media after the latest revelations brought to the fore the conflict between Finance Minister Mukherjee and Chidambaram.

The mistrust in the relations between the two leaders was out in the open recently when Mukherjee complained about his office being bugged.

For the record, Congress attempted to treat the communication — marked “as seen by the Finance Minister” in the covering letter — as the handiwork of a junior official in the ministry.

“The note is ipso facto a summarisation of events (leading up to 2G spectrum allocation) by a junior officer of the Finance Ministry, which also includes his own views,” Singhvi pointed out adding that it was not a note from the Finance Minister, as was being made out.

“This attempt by mischievous elements to create a rift between constitutional functionaries is regrettable and should be avoided at all cost,” Singhvi said.

To underline the baselessness of the allegations made in the Finance Ministry’s note, he referred to the stand taken by the CAG in its report on 2G allocation. Singhvi recalled that it was the CAG’s own stand that the DoT, in 2002-03 and later, had managed to get terms of reference amended to keep the issue of spectrum pricing outside the Group of Ministers.

Singhvi said the CAG report had said DoT had relied on a Cabinet decision of Oct 31, 2003, to ensure that is was the Telecom Ministry alone which had the jurisdiction to finalise the spectrum fee.