INDIA’S granting of telecoms licences in 2008 may have been flawed, the telecoms minister said on Friday (January 7), but rejected estimates of huge revenue loss that have brought political deadlock to Asia’s third-largest economy.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India said in November the country’s coffers may have lost $39bn (£25.09bn) because telecoms licences were given out cheaply, forcing Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh’s coalition on to the backfoot and putting policymaking into virtual limbo.
But in some of his strongest comments yet, telecoms minister Kapil Sibal dismissed the state auditor’s estimate of potential losses as “utterly erroneous.”
“We do believe that prima facie there was something wrong in the procedure adopted in the allocation of 2G spectrum,” Sibal told a news conference, referring to second-generation mobile telecoms technology.
Sibal said the actual loss of funds was zero because the government had only followed policy framed by the previous administration.
“We do believe that the (auditor’s) exercise was fraught with very serious errors which has resulted in the kind of sensationalism which has allowed the opposition to spread utter falsehood to the people of this country,” Sibal said.
Opposition parties forced the closure of parliamentary proceedings in December over the row and threatened to disrupt the February budget session unless the government set up a joint enquiry into the scandal.
The government has rejected the opposition calls, saying a separate enquiry was under way.
Sibal’s comments were seen as an attempt to regain the political initiative from opposition camp over an issue that saw Telecoms Minister Andimuthu Raja resign in November.
Sibal said a former judge and federal investigators were investigating if there were any irregularities in the 2G process.
