Witch-hunt against Fernandes: Jaitley

NEW DELHI : Navy chief Admiral Arun Prakash’s endorsement of the Barak anti-missile system has provided political muscle to the Opposition’s attack on the government for launching a ‘witch-hunt’ against former defence minister George Fernandes.

A day after the Navy chief put up a strong defence of the anti-missile system’s acquisition from Israel, asserting that due procedures and norms had been followed in carrying out the transaction and the missile had a proven track-record, the BJP came out with all guns blazing against the Manmohan Singh government, daring it “to produce even a shred of evidence’’ against Mr Fernandes for any irregularities in the deal.

The party, in the process, came out with the strongest defence so far of Mr Fernandes’ handling of the defence ministry and the acquisitions made by the armed forces during his tenure. “If baseless cases against retired admirals and former defence ministers are registered, the entire procurement system and the country’s defence preparedness suffers,” BJP general secretary Arun Jaitley said here on Tuesday afternoon.

However, defence minister Pranab Mukherjee said it was “not about the merit or demerits of a weapon system. It’s about whether the procedures have been duly followed and whether there is any criminality in the transaction,’’ he told newspersons on the sidelines of the naval commanders conference.

Observing that the CBI had filed charges against Mr Fernandes only on these two counts, the defence minister said, “But the entire media focus is on whether a particular system is good or bad; this is not the issue. The issue is totally different.”

The BJP, however, continued to train its guns on the government for “systematically targeting’’ Mr Fernandes. “What equipment to buy or not isn’t the responsibility of the government or the CBI. It is the elements which have to use the system finally who are its best judges. Even Mr Mukherjee has now been forced to assert that the Barak missiles have proved their worth,’’ the BJP spokesman said.