SIBAL v CAG
THE public battle between the revered Comptroller and Auditor General of India and the Hon'ble Minister of Telecom is continuing unabated providing the much needed political entertainment, badly needed at a time when less entertaining stories like onions and inflation have no answers.
The CAG sharply reacted to Kapil Sibal's answers to the CAG's presumptive estimate in the 2G scam.
According to the CAG,
++ Making public comments on the matter which is being considered by a Parliamentary Committee is highly improper and may even amount to contempt of the House.
++ When any matter is under consideration of a Parliamentary Committee and the Committee is holding its sittings for that purpose, no persons, including a Member of Parliament should make or publish a statement or comment about that matter.
This is the way the CAG prepares his reports. Now he is not sure whether Sibal's comments amount to contempt of the Parliament. He says they MAY amount to contempt. The CAG says that when something is before a Parliamentary Committee, nobody should talk about it. Why Sir? And in what era are we living? What prevents the citizens from expressing their views on an issue before a Parliamentary Committee? And what is wrong with it? Are we interested in knowing the truth or hiding it? This is the typical Audit mindset – you can criticize everybody, but at the slightest remark against you, you get offended. After all, this is supposed to be a democracy and democracy triumphs on debate, not on suppression of views.
After all Kapil Sibal was one of our top lawyers living with, ‘my lords', ‘learned brothers' and ‘humble submissions' and accepting every order with ‘much obliged' submission. He must be knowing his law. If CAG can go public, so should the minister. The game should be fair.
According to CAG, the loss is 1,76,000,00,00,000; according to the minister, it is zero as he has just removed the 176. The actual figure could be somewhere in between.
The CAG's job is over after he has submitted his report to Parliament – why should he comment even if the minister was irresponsible?