NEW DELHI—Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, seeking to defend his government amid a growing political crisis, denied there was infighting in his cabinet over a corruption scandal and accused the leading opposition party of being “prematurely restless” for early elections.
Mr. Singh, who was addressing reporters aboard a plane returning from the general session of the United Nations, weighed in as speculation was mounting in New Delhi about a brewing battle between two men who are considered potential future candidates for prime minister, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Home Minister P. Chidambaram.
The disclosure last week of a Finance Ministry memo about a controversial 2008 sale of mobile-phone spectrum was widely interpreted in the Indian media as an attempt by Mr. Mukherjee to blame Mr. Chidambaram, his predecessor as finance minister, for failing to prevent what turned into a massive alleged telecom corruption scam. Reports of a battle between the two men has dominated the news for the past several days, especially after both men met Monday with Congress party President Sonia Gandhi, the country’s most powerful politician.
“The ministerial fight you are talking about, I am not aware of such thing,” Mr. Singh said at a press conference aboard Air India One, according to the Press Trust of India. “We are a cohesive government,” he said. “There is no room for dissension in my cabinet.”
Mr. Chidambaram has declined to comment on the matter. Mr. Mukherjee told reporters Monday that Mr. Chidambaram is a “valued colleague” and a “pillar of strength for the party and government.”
The Congress party-led government, already weakened by a season of corruption scandals that have stalled all significant legislative activity and led to high-profile confrontations with civil society, can’t afford any further distractions. The government, halfway through a five-year term that began in 2009, is already fighting the perception that it is too sullied by charges of graft to deal with pressing problems like inflation and terrorism and to follow through on promised economic plans such as land reform.
The leading opposition Bharatiya Janata Party has seized on the Finance Ministry memo, claiming it is evidence of wrongdoing in the upper echelon of the Congress party. The BJP has called for Mr. Chidambaram’s resignation and for him to be targeted by investigators probing the 2008 spectrum sale.
Mr. Singh, normally a soft-spoken, genial politician, turned combative when discussing how the BJP has sought to turn recent events to its political advantage. The BJP thinks it can force early elections, he said, according to the Press Trust of India. “This government has the mandate for five years. It will stay its course.”
The memo that started the recent flap was sent by a Finance Ministry official to Prime Minister Singh’s office in March but became public only last week as part of court proceedings. It summarized a convoluted flurry of interministerial correspondence over the appropriate way to allocate mobile-phone spectrum—the airwaves that carry cellphone signals—to telecom companies.
The memo suggests that Mr. Chidambaram didn’t push the telecom ministry—led by then-minister A. Raja, who is now in trial on corruption-related charges over his own alleged role in the scandal—to auction airwaves and instead sanctioned the sale of frequencies at fixed low prices, thereby lowering the amount of revenue the government could earn.
This sparked considerable interest in New Delhi’s elite media and political circles because the spectrum scandal revolves around the claim that some in the government colluded with private telecom firms to give out airwaves at huge discounts.
Congress party officials are downplaying the memo, saying the media is reading too much into it and denying any cabinet infighting. They point out that the memo was “seen by” Mr. Mukherjee but was actually written and signed by a junior officer. The memo also doesn’t accuse Mr. Chidambaram of accepting any kickbacks or doing anything to further the spectrum corruption scam. It only implies that he knew there was something inappropriate about pricing spectrum at low levels and yet didn’t do anything about it.
“This is not battle,” Law Minister Salman Khurshid told NDTV news channel Tuesday evening, adding that top government officials have “the best of cordial relations.”
Meanwhile, Mr. Chidambaram appears to have emerged unscathed—and perhaps even strengthened—from the brouhaha. Mr. Singh earlier told reporters the home minister “continues to enjoy and inspire my full confidence.” Other Congress leaders also rallied to his side in recent days. Mr. Chidambaram reportedly offered his resignation this week but was turned down. Government officials didn’t return requests for comment.
The memo says the Finance Ministry under Mr. Chidambaram’s leadership admonished the telecom ministry in the fall of 2007 to revise spectrum prices and make them more realistic. And it says that in January 2008, after the controversial spectrum sale was over, Mr. Chidambaram sent the prime minister a note arguing that future allotments should be done by giving out a small slice of “starter” spectrum for free but auctioning anything beyond that.
The letter goes on to suggest that Mr. Chidambaram missed a chance in early 2008 to institute an auction retroactively, even though by that point several companies had already made payments for spectrum licenses that they believed entitled them to a bundle of frequencies. The letter said this was legally possible and added, “Perhaps some litigations would have arisen as a consequence.”
News Source: Wall Street Journal
