Rafale case: Perjury plea by petitioners 'completely misconceived', Cen

In a reply affidavit submitted in the apex court on the application filed by former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie and activist lawyer Prashant Bhushan the Centre said the allegations of making false statements and suppressing facts from the court were completely false and baselessThe government said its submissions in the court were based on records while the petitioners were relying on selective leaks in media from the Ministry of Defence files on opinions expressed by individual officers or a group of officers and this presents an incomplete picture on matters relating to national security and defenceOn facts as well the contention of the petitioners that the officials of the answering respondent Centre have made false statements and suppressed evidence while submitting information on decisionmaking process offsets and pricing pursuant to orders passed by this court is completely false baseless and an attempt to intimidate government servants from performing their duty on this ground alone the application is liable to be dismissed it saidA bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi is scheduled to hear on Friday the pleas seeking review of its December 14 last year verdict in the Rafale case along with applications seeking perjury action against unknown government servants and production of certain documents before the courtOn December 14 last year the apex court had dismissed the plea filed by Sinha Shourie and Bhushan seeking probe into alleged irregularities in the multicrore Rafale fighter jet deal In its reply to the application seeking perjury action the Centre has said that in view of dismissal of the main writ petition the present application which has been filed is not at all maintainableThe Centre said that all the averments made before the Supreme Court were based on a the final decisions taken by the Cabinet Committee on Security CCS and the CCS note which formed the basis of this decision b final decisions by the Raksha Mantri RM and Defence Acquisition Council DAC c provisions in defence procurement procedure and d inputs received from the Indian Air Force and other constituent offices of the Ministry of DefenceThere is no act of perjury involved in the submissions made before the Supreme Court as the submissions are based on records it said adding The information provided to the court is after due approval of the competent authorities based on records documents and decisionsThe affidavit alleged that petitioners were deliberately providing incomplete and selective information and altering the sequence of events of the procurement process to misled the apex court and the publicIt is submitted that placing reliance on some media reports and some incomplete internal file notings procured unauthorisedly and illegally the petitioners cannot seek to reopen the whole matter by filing false and frivolous applications and terming it as perjury and attempt to get a fishing and roving inquiry ordered which this court has specifically declined to go into based on perceptions of individuals it saidIt also said that media reports cannot form the basis for seeking initiation of perjury proceedings since it is well settled that courts do not take decisions on the basis of media reportsThe affidavit said that plea seeking perjury action was completely misconceived and liable to be dismissedThe contents of the briefsresponses were based on official recordsfilesinputs from various constituents affiliated entities within the MoD such as DoMW DDP for offsets the IAF and the HQIDS which acts as the Secretariat of the DAC and the same were finalised after extensive deliberations at the highest levels in government after a series of meetings the affidavit saidIt said that the petitioners main contention regarding alleged overpriced deal was not supported by the CAG reportReferring to the records the affidavit said that Centre has no role in the selection of Indian offset partner which is a commercial decision of the original equipment manufacturerThe concerns raised by members of the INT were deliberated and addressed while ensuring utmost integrity and transparency in the process allowing opinions to be freely expressed recorded discussed and if necessary modified Aspects pertaining to the responsibility and obligations of the French government pricing delivery schedule maintenance terms offsets IGA terms etc were discussed and negotiated during these meetings it saidIndia signed an agreement with France for the purchase of 36 Rafale fighter aircraft in a flyaway condition as part of the upgrading process of Indian Air Force equipment The deal is estimated to be about Rs 58000 crore about USD 8 billionThe Rafale fighter is a twinengine Medium MultiRole Combat Aircraft MMRCA manufactured by French aerospace company Dassault AviationCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get the latest updates