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Pawar advises Pranab, Chidambaram to publicise facts on 2G note issue

Thane, Sat, 01 Oct 2011 ANI

Thane, Oct 1 (ANI): Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar has advised both Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Home Minister P. Chidambaram to place all facts related to the 2G Spectrum allocation before the public in the interest of good governance.

"In the interest of good governance, Mukherjee and Chidambaram must project the truth about the 2G telecom spectrum allocation," Pawar told the media.

"Whatever the controversy was there, that was created by media, certain of our friends, they have raised this type of issue in some other forum. So, in such situation, what I will refer to my both senior colleagues is to bring proper facts before public at large," said Pawar.

He said the Central Government is trying to present facts related to the 2G spectrum issue in a transparent manner.

"See, the government and the Congress are trying to tell the truth, I didn't see the record, as I don't have anything and the file is in the hands of judge, and see what Congress said about Subramanian Swamy, it has some basis. And, on this basis, some statements have been made. When somebody has not done anything wrong, then a situation of misunderstanding comes, so the government has to find the truth," Pawar said.

It may be recalled that Chidambaram came under fire after a 14-page note, prepared by a senior bureaucrat in the Finance Ministry and seen by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, suggested that Chidambaram could have acted more stridently in 2008 on the spectrum pricing issue, when he was the country's Finance Minister.

The March 25 note to the PMO from the Finance Ministry says Chidambaram could have "stuck to the stand" of an auction of the highly valuable spectrum.

The note came into the public domain under the Right to Information (RTI) Act petition filed by Vivek Garg, a prominent activist.

The telecom scam, one of India"s biggest graft cases ever, may have cost 39.57 billion dollars in revenue to the public exchequer as per the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). (ANI)