PM washes his hands of S-band spectrum deal

New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has completely washed his hands off the controversial deal between Devas Multimedia and Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) commercial arm Antrix Corporation Ltd that is alleged to have caused a loss of over Rs 2 lakh crore to the Government.

He said that the decision regarding the Antrix-Devas deal was made by the departments concerned and ISRO, and that the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) was not in the know of the details of the deal. He added that the only time the matter came up with the PMO was when his office had to facilitate the deal regarding two satellites.

"The issue of providing two satellites was before the Cabinet. The Cabinet note did not, however, mention the details of the Devas-Antrix deal," Singh said while replying to supplementary during the Question Hour in the Rajya Sabha

The Prime Minister said that there was no question of the PMO being asked to approve the Antrix-Devas deal on S-band spectrum.

"The Antrix-Devas issue did not come to the Cabinet. These decisions are taken by the departments," said Singh. The Department of Space, under which ISRO comes, is handled by the prime Minister.

However, the Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley targeted the Prime Minister asking how the deal could have been cleared without the Government being kept in the loop.

"We are given to understand that the Minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office, Prime Minister's Principal Secretary, National Security Advisor and Cabinet Secretary are all privy to that decision. Are we to understand that while all this was happening, the PMO despite participating of all senior officials including the Minister of State was completely unaware that a valuable public asset is being placed in hands of an Indian company which is an arm of an American company and at an inadequate consideration and we were completely unaware of this," said Jaitley.

The Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) had on February 17 decided to terminate the Antrix-Devas citing national security.

The decision to annul the deal was taken at a meeting of the CCS chaired by Singh on the basis of a recommendation from the Space Commission.

The annulment comes in the wake of a raging controversy over the deal for handing over 70 Mhz of S-Band spectrum to the private firm for Rs 1,000 crore on which the CAG has already initiated action.

According to certain estimates, this deal may have resulted in a loss of Rs 2 lakh crore to the exchequer.