The Hindu : Delhi High Court quashes bribery charges in Bofors case

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 05, 2004

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Delhi High Court quashes bribery charges in Bofors case

By Our New Delhi Bureau

NEW DELHI, FEB. 4. The Delhi High Court today quashed the charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act against the three Hinduja brothers in the Bofors case.

It held that there was no evidence to support the allegation that the brothers bribed the late Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, and the then Defence Secretary, S.K. Bhatnagar, for winning the Bofors howitzer contract.

However, the court upheld the decision of the special court framing charges of cheating and conspiracy against the Hinduja brothers — S.P. Hinduja, G.P. Hinduja and P.P. Hinduja.

It also upheld the framing of charges of fabrication of documents under Section 465 of the Indian Penal Code against the Swedish company, AB Bofors, which supplied the Howitzer Field 155 MM guns. The court asked the trial court to proceed with the trial on February 23 in respect of these charges.

Pronouncing the 115-page judgment, Justice J.D. Kapoor said: "The facts of the case itself show that so far as the public servants — Rajiv Gandhi and S.K. Bhatnagar — are concerned, 16 years of investigation by a premier agency of the country — the Central Bureau of Investigation — could not unearth a scintilla of evidence against them for having accepted bribe/illegal gratification in awarding the contract in favour of A.B. Bofors, now rechristened Kartongen Kemi Ochi Forvaltning AB, which had won the bid to supply 410 guns to the country."

"All efforts by the CBI ended in a fiasco as they could not lay hand upon any secret or known account of these public servants where the alleged money might have found its abode either in Swiss banks or any other bank or vault," Mr. Justice Kapoor said.

"Charges for the offences punishable under Sections 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Section 5 (2) read with Section 5 (1) (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947, and Section 165A (public servant obtaining valuable thing, without consideration, from a person concerned in any proceeding or business transacted by such public servant) read with 161 (accepting gratification other than legal remuneration) against the petitioners for having entered into a criminal conspiracy with the public servants to cheat the Government of India and having abetted the public servants to commit criminal conduct by abusing their official position and taken illegal gratification for awarding the contract are quashed," the judgment said.

However, Mr. Justice Kapoor gave credit to the CBI for tracing the money received as "commission" by middlemen/agents — "Win Chadha (since dead), the Italian businessman, Quattrocchi, and the Hinduja brothers — employed by Bofors for negotiating the contract.

Therefore, Mr. Justice Kapoor ordered trial of the three Hinduja brothers "for having entered into a criminal conspiracy to cheat the Government of India by fraudulently and dishonestly representing that there were no agents involved in the negotiation for the contract, and further that the price quoted was the reduced price proportionate to the amount of commission they would have otherwise paid to the agents."

Mr. Justice Kapoor said: "The middlemen induced the Government of India to award the contract in favour of Bofors and caused wrongful loss the Government to the extent of the amount Bofors would have paid as commission to the agents — the Hinduja brothers, Win Chadha and Quattrocchi."

A.B. Bofors, Mr. Justice Kapoor said, would face trial for the offence punishable under Section 465 of IPC (forgery) for having made false documents saying that there were no middlemen in the deal.

Mr. Justice Kapoor ordered that the charges against the Hinduja brothers, Martin Ardbo, then chief of A.B. Bofors, and Quattrocchi shall be framed by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate as the offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act against the accused had been quashed by this court.

All the accused would appear before the CMM on February 23 for further proceedings, the judgment said.

Since Quattrocchi and Ardbo are absconding, they would face trial when they appear before the court.

The Special Judge for CBI cases here, Prem Kumar, had framed the charges against all the living accused persons in 2002.

He had also passed certain observations on the role and alleged culpability of Rajiv Gandhi. The Hinduja brothers and A.B. Bofors had challenged his orders in the High Court.

The FIR in the case had been lodged in 1989 during the prime ministership of V.P. Singh. The CBI had filed a chargesheet in the case in 1999.

Later, it filed a supplementary chargesheet against the three Hinduja brothers.

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