Modi Govt Must Come Clean on Prizing of Rafale Deal - Bhushan - Yadav - Swaraj Abhiyan Part 3.
Channel: Swaraj Abhiyan
Date: 2016-10-21

These disclosures have come from Mr. Edmonds Allen, an ex-partner of Abhishek Verma who turned whistleblower. He has written letters dated 25.08.2016 and 16.09.2016 to the Prime Minister, the Defence Minister and the National Security Advisor. In this mail he provides the details as to how defence secrets are being compromised by Abhishek Verma and his associates. 

One of the key revelations by Allen is that despite being tried in a sensitive and high profile case of leakage of defence information, Abhishek Verma continued to receive and pass on defence secrets till as late as 2011. In his letter dated 25.08.2016, addressed to the Prime Minister, Allen gives the details of the role played by various retired Naval Officers in providing top secret and sensitive information of the Indian Navy including Scorpene Submarines to notorious arms dealer Abhishek Verma, who, he has been found to be actively involved with others in leaking defence secrets to foreign entities. Edmonds Allen has enclosed various emails exchanged between Abhsihek Verma and Wing Cdr Sam Lal, co-accused in Navy War Room Leak case, Gili Golan, an Israeli national  and others which show that:
Abhihek Verma has been using his email id manager@intercompanymail.com to exchange various defence secrets;

An email dated 14.10.2011 was circulated with an attachment titled “Briefing Note Project 75 and LPD from consultant October 13,20.pdf”, which had the Minutes of Meeting of the Defence Acquisition Council chaired by the then Defence Minister. The said minutes carried a report namely Krishnamurthy Report on P75i Submarines. As is mentioned above, these are the same Scorpene Submarines whose details have recently been reportedly leaked to the Australian media and thereby, their stealth attack capability has been completely compromised. The Briefing Note Project 75 which was sent to the PM by Allen is not being attached here. 

Apparently Allen had also written to the CBI on 4/9/12 claiming that Verma had sent another file as attachment titled as “Navy Consultant PDF” which seemed to have to do with the purchase of Helicopters.
There are emails exchanged on behalf of a company Ganton Ltd. whose management has members like Anca Neacsu Verma (Abhishek Verma’s wife), Ravi Chauhan (involved in Navy War Room Leak case) and Wg. Cdr (rtd.) Sam Lal. In one of emails, Anca Neacsu Verma is saying “..we would also wish to speak to you about Indian Navy’s Project 75i which is for construction of 6 diesel powered submarines for induction in 2020. We are quite well versed with the said project and in 2005 we had effectively assisted DCN-Thales in the sales of 6 Scorpene Submarines to the Indian Navy.”

Copy of the letter dated 25.08.2016 of Edmonds Allen along with its enclosures is being annexed hereto as Annexure B. (We have removed some pages from these annexures as these contain minutes of some confidential meetings) 

The Government of India, despite having the above information regarding payment of commission, went ahead and signed Rs. 58,000 crore deal for procurement of 36 Rafale Aircrafts on 23.09.2016 with a company known as Dassault Aviation. It is crucial to note here that Dassault Aviation had acquired Thales, the company that should have been blacklisted for using middlemen in the Scorpen deal. Even otherwise the deal has raised many questions. The Defence Minister in an interview to Doordarshan on 13.04.2016 had said that originally 126 aircrafts were to be purchased for Rs. 90,000 Crores. He revised this figure to Rs. 1.3 lakh crore in a subsequent interview to PTI. The Defence Minister did not explain this escalation. However, if the figure of Rs. 90,000 crore is correct then the 36 aircrafts are being purchased nearly at double the cost of the original deal to buy 126 aircrafts. Copy of The Scroll report dated 24.09.2016 is being annexed hereto as Annexure C.

The fact that the Government was aware about the payment of commission in Scorpene deal is also confirmed from the latest statement made by the present Defence Minister on 10.10.2016 that “there was “dalali” in 2006 during the submarines deal”. Copy of the TOI report dated 10.10.2016 is being annexed hereto as Annexure D.