Author: S Gurumurthy
Publication: The New Indian Express
Date: April 30, 2009
URL: http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=Who+will+probe+first+familys+billions?&artid=X2zQlPcQFAE=&SectionID=d16Fdk4iJhE=&MainSectionID=HuSUEmcGnyc=&SectionName=aVlZZy44Xq0bJKAA84nwcg==&SEO=
Mrs Antonia Maino (aka Sonia) Gandhi has finally
broken her silence on the Indian slush money abroad. She told her party workers
in Mangalore on April 27, 2009 that "the Congress was taking steps to
address the issue of untaxed Indian money in Swiss banks". The delayed
response of the first family of the Congress party, troubled by the issue
from the word go, is understandable. But, the Swiss money has already become
an electoral issue. That is what has finally forced the family to speak so
that the party is not any further seen as being in denial and cynical about
the Indian slush funds abroad. It is the family's silence, and the party's
denial, that turned the issue into an election agenda. Shorn of the allegations
normal in election time, all that L K Advani had said on March 29 was this:
'Mr Prime Minister, vigorously take up the issue of Swiss type secret banking
and tax havens in the G20 meeting of April 2'. Had the PM told Advani that
that was precisely what he was intending to do, that would have been the end
of the BJP effort to make an issue of it. A Congress party, unburdened by
its first family's anxieties, would have done precisely that, particularly
when elections are round the corner. But neither the PM nor the party officials
would dare do that. Why? Read on for the underlying drives.
The first family has other, perhaps bigger,
reasons to worry, apart from about the Bofors slush money. Two more stunning
exposures - but not as well-known as the Bofors scam - make the first family
a target for investigation on slush money. Now on to the heart of the story
which has three limbs.
First: $2.2 billions in Rajiv's secret accounts,
says Swiss magazine
The shocking exposure came from Switzerland
itself. The most popular magazine of Switzerland, Schweizer Illustrierte,
[dated November 11, 1991] did an expose of 14 politicians of developing nations
who, it said, had stashed their bribes in Swiss banks. The title of the expose
in German read "Fluchgelder - Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren".
In English it meant, "Curse of money - The Swiss bank accounts of the
Dictators". Rajiv Gandhi figured in the expose as one with slush funds
in secret accounts. Schweizer Illustrierte is not some rag. It is the Number
One Swiss magazine and sells some 2,10,000 copies. Its readership is 9,18,000
- some 15 per cent of Swiss adults. The magazine had mentioned specific amounts
in secret Swiss accounts of different leaders with their pictures alongside.
The report under the picture of Rajiv Gandhi,
translated into English, read: "2.5 billion francs on the Indian secret
accounts in Switzerland" of "Rajiv Gandhi, Indian". Today the
amount of 2.5 billion Swiss Francs equals 2.2 billion US Dollars. But as Rajiv
was no more by then, it must become the family inheritance. The other leaders
captured by the magazine were: Suharto of Indonesia (25.5 billion), Haile
Selassie of Ethiopia (22.5 billion), Mobutu of Zaire (6 billion), Shah Pehlvi
of Iran (5.7 billion), Saddam Hussein of Iraq (800 million), and Nicolas Ceausescu
of Romania (500 million). The figures of slush money mentioned were in milliarden
(meaning 'billions') units of Swiss Francs. Had Rajiv been alive then, the
expose would have caused a political tsunami in India.
The box item above shows the pictures and
the amounts of the leaders as appearing in the magazine.
More than the slush money charge it is the
family's silence about it, which is baffling. The number one magazine in Switzerland
had made the damning charge that Rajiv Gandhi had left behind slush funds
of $2.2 billion and yet the family has kept mum for 18 years now. How could
any honest person tolerate such a serious charge? Well, one could say that
the family might not have challenged it because it was published in far away
Switzerland. But Dr Subramanian Swamy had included the Schweizer Illustrierte
expose in his write-up "Do You know your Sonia?" in his party, the
Janata Party, website, seven years ago, in 2002. It is still on the Party's
website. Photocopies of the expose in the Swiss magazine are shown at pages
51 to 53 of Dr Swamy's write-up; also an e-mail from the magazine addressed
to Dr Swamy on February 22, 2002 at page 50. The e-mail confirms what the
magazine had reported.
The e-mail reads:
"Dear sir,
We refer to your e-mail of April 4, regarding
an article in our magazine Schweizer Illustrierte of November 11, 1991. In
this article - Fluchgelder - Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren - is Rajiv
Gandhi named with tot 2.5 Milliarden CHF on secret accounts. If you want the
magazine please indicate the exact address.
Yours faithfully,
Ringer Ltd.
Margot Todisco".
The fax and telephone numbers of Margot Todisco
are also given in the mail. The e-mail is in box alongside here. Yet no one
from the Congress or from the family has sued Dr Swamy till date, nor challenged
him. The Swiss expose also prominently figured in the advertisement that some
NRIs had put out in the New York Times to protest against Sonia Gandhi when
she visited the US in the year 2007. The Indian National Overseas Congress
(INOC) filed a defamation case against the ad, expressly "not to defend
itself, but Sonia Gandhi". The New York Supreme Court dismissed the case
holding that only Sonia Gandhi, not the INOC, had the locus to sue. But she
would not dare sue. Thus, neither in Switzerland where Schweizer Illustrierte
exposed Rajiv's secret account with billions 18 years ago in 1991, nor in
India where Dr Swamy had put it on his party's website seven years ago in
2002, or in the US where the NRIs had boldly advertised the expose two years
ago in 2007, would the Gandhi family challenge the expose.
In criminal law the conduct of the accused
is an important piece of evidence. What does the family's conduct show here
excepting that it has something to hide.
Second: family benefited from KGB, says book
The second expose, Rajiv Gandhi figuring again,
is that the first family of the Congress accepted political payoffs from the
Russian spy outfit, the KGB. In a highly acclaimed book The State Within a
State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia-Past, Present, and Future by Yevgenia
Albats, a journalist on Moscow News and Izvestia, the author writes: "A
letter signed by Victor Chebrikov, who replaced Andropov as the KGB head in
1982, noted: the USSR KGB maintains contact with the son of the Premier Minister
Rajiv Gandhi (of India). R Gandhi expresses deep gratitude for the benefits
accruing to the prime minister's family from the commercial dealings of the
firm he controls in co-operation with the Soviet Foreign trade organisations.
R Gandhi reports confidentially that a substantial portion of the funds obtained
through this channel are used to support the party of R Gandhi." (p223)
The author also cites the KGB letter and file reference. In Dr Swamy's write-up
on Sonia, KGB's letter in Russian is attached at page 45 and its English translation
at pages 43 and 44.
The letter says that Rajiv Gandhi himself
has admitted that "benefits" accrued to "the prime minister's
family" from commercial dealings through Russian co-operation. All major
newspapers, The Hindu and Times of India included, had carried the expose
on KGB payments. The book State within a State on KGB was published in 1994.
Yet, no one from the Gandhi family has challenged
it for 15 years now. Dr Swamy had included it in his expose on Sonia on his
party's website since 2002. Yet the family has not challenged him or sued
him for seven years. It was again made part of the NRI advertisement in New
York Times in 2007 when Sonia Gandhi visited the US.
Even then only a proxy case was filed to defend
Sonia Gandhi's reputation which was promptly saying only Sonia could defend
her honour, which she would not.
Third: Bofors slush payoff to 'Q'
Ottavio Quottrocchi, the star actor in the
Bofors scam, is indistinguishable from Sonia's family. His association with
the family is as old as Sonia's.
Even Sonia Gandhi cannot dispute that Q got
the first instalment of $7.3 million out of the total bribe of $36.5 million
(Three per cent of the contract value of $1.2 billion) due to his front company
for swinging the gun deal for Bofors. The slush money of $7.3 million was
traced to Q's account by the CBI which got it frozen some 20 years ago. But
when the law was closing in on Q in early 1990s, the Congress government stealthily
allowed him to escape from India. He turned fugitive, but his slush money
had continued to remain frozen.
Sten Lindstorm, the Swedish police official
who investigated the Bofors case for 18 years, wrote an article in 2004, saying
that Sonia should be interrogated in the Bofors case, particularly on her
family's relations with Q, on who introduced Q to Bofors and why did Bofors
pay him for deal with India. This article had appeared in several media in
India. Subsequently, the CBI, obviously under pressure, quietly allowed Q
to smuggle away his slush money from the frozen account.
The UPA was in power then, with Sonia Gandhi
as chairperson of the National Advisory Council and also of the UPA. Could
this happen unless she had wanted it? She owes an answer to the nation. But,
far from answering any question, she asked the media, as early as in 1999,
to show evidence against Q, when the most clinching evidence, the loot caught
in Q's frozen account, had fixed him conclusively.
Yet, she defended him even after the Swiss
court once, the Delhi High court twice and the Supreme Court finally held
him part of the Bofor's fraud. And now, in the final days of its rule, her
government has shamelessly let Q off the hook by removing his name from global
red alert. Because of the red alert he was always in danger of being caught
and sent to India. Now that's off. This move to free Q seems to be linked
to the slush money issue rising in crescendo in this election. It seems to
be in the larger interests of the family - she has to protect 'Q', if he has
to protect the family. Otherwise just before elections no government will
take the unpopular decision of freeing Q from India's legal net abroad.
QED: It does not need a seer to say that the
first family of the Congress party is a suspect; a target for probe.
Who will probe its billions? Rahul Gandhi
has told an election rally in Hyderabad, "elect us, we will investigate".
If that happens, the suspects will probe themselves!
