Retracting from its earlier stand, the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) on Tuesday claimed now they have enough evidence to prove that former Army chief Gen VK Singh, currently a cabinet minister in the NDA government, was offered Rs 14 crore bribe by retired Lt General Tejinder Singh, who was acting at the behest of a foreign firm. Not the least, the CBI has also mentioned in its charge-sheet that no tapes of conversation of the alleged bribe offer by Singh was handed over to them by the former Army chief, as was claimed a year ago. Then, it was believed that the bribe offer was caught on tape and the CBI had rejected them as ‘irrelevant’.
‘During investigation, former Army chief VK Singh claimed to have recorded the conversation.
However, the same was not provided by him to the investigating agency despite efforts,’ the CBI charge-sheet reads. Rubbishing CBI’s observation, former army chief’s lawyer Vishwajeet Singh, while speaking to the media, said, ‘There was some tapes and it is unfortunate that the CBI could not retrieve anything. It is not our fault.’ CBI’s ‘U’ turn after a year on the sensitive case has raised serious questions over the functioning of the premier probe agency.
In 2010, the former Army chief had claimed that he was offered bribe by Singh to fix a deal worth Rs 1,193 crore to supply 1,676 Tatra trucks to the Indian Army. On 19 October, 2012, a case was registered against Singh based on former Army chief’s statement, who is currently the minister of state for external affairs and minister of state in-charge of department of northeast region. On 15 July, the CBI filed a chargesheet in the court of Special Judge in Patiala House Court against Singh.
The charge-sheet was based on circumstantial evidence, and was filed under the Section 12 of Prevention of Corruption Act, which deals with the offence of offering a bribe to a public servant.
The CBI also said former defence minister AK Antony, a witness in the Tatra truck case, admitted that the former Army chief had informed him of the bribe offer by Singh for clearing the trucks’ purchase file. He also alleged that Antony never took any action after being informed about the bribe offered to him.
Reacting to the development, Tejinder Singh said, ‘My interaction with the agency clearly indicated that there was no credible evidence found. Now with the change of government, there seems to be a change of heart in the probe agency and therefore the filing of charge-sheet is abuse of power by the people concerned and politically motivated.’
It is learnt that investigating officers did not want a charge-sheet against Tejinder Singh and the matter was taken to the CBI director Ranjit Sinha and he asked the investigating officers to have a relook in the case considering ‘sensitivity’ of the matter.