rinkusheoran
New member
Who will probe first family's billions?
<img class="image_none" height="54" width="216">
S Gurumurthy
First Published : 30 Apr 2009 12:41:00 AM IST
Last Updated : 30 Apr 2009 05:15:34 PM IST
Mrs Antonia Maino (aka Sonia) Gandhi has finally broken her silence on the Indian slush money abroad. She told her party workers in Mangalore on April 27, 2009 that "the Congress was taking steps to address the issue of untaxed Indian money in Swiss banks". The delayed response of the first family of the Congress party, troubled by the issue from the word go, is understandable. But, the Swiss money has already become an electoral issue. That is what has finally forced the family to speak so that the party is not any further seen as being in denial and cynical about the Indian slush funds abroad. It is the family's silence, and the party's denial, that turned the issue into an election agenda. Shorn of the allegations normal in election time, all that L K Advani had said on March 29 was this: 'Mr Prime Minister, vigorously take up the issue of Swiss type secret banking and tax havens in the G20 meeting of April 2'. Had the PM told Advani that that was precisely what he was intending to do, that would have been the end of the BJP effort to make an issue of it. A Congress party, unburdened by its first family's anxieties, would have done precisely that, particularly when elections are round the corner. But neither the PM nor the party officials would dare do that. Why? Read on for the underlying drives.The first family has other, perhaps bigger, reasons to worry, apart from about the Bofors slush money. Two more stunning exposures — but not as well-known as the Bofors scam — make the first family a target for investigation on slush money. Now on to the heart of the story which has three limbs.First: $2.2 billions in Rajiv's secret accounts, says Swiss magazineThe shocking exposure came from Switzerland itself. The most popular magazine of Switzerland, Schweizer Illustrierte, [dated November 11, 1991] did an expose of 14 politicians of developing nations who, it said, had stashed their bribes in Swiss banks. The title of the expose in German read “Fluchgelder — Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren”. In English it meant, “Curse of money — The Swiss bank accounts of the Dictators”. Rajiv Gandhi figured in the expose as one with slush funds in secret accounts. Schweizer Illustrierte is not some rag. It is the Number One Swiss magazine and sells some 2,10,000 copies. Its readership is 9,18,000 — some 15 per cent of Swiss adults. The magazine had mentioned specific amounts in secret Swiss accounts of different leaders with their pictures alongside.The report under the picture of Rajiv Gandhi, translated into English, read: "2.5 billion francs on the Indian secret accounts in Switzerland" of "Rajiv Gandhi, Indian". Today the amount of 2.5 billion Swiss Francs equals 2.2 billion US Dollars. But as Rajiv was no more by then, it must become the family inheritance. The other leaders captured by the magazine were: Suharto of Indonesia (25.5 billion), Haile Selassie of Ethiopia (22.5 billion), Mobutu of Zaire (6 billion), Shah Pehlvi of Iran (5.7 billion), Saddam Hussein of Iraq (800 million), and Nicolas Ceausescu of Romania (500 million). The figures of slush money mentioned were in milliarden (meaning ‘billions’) units of Swiss Francs. Had Rajiv been alive then, the expose would have caused a political tsunami in India.The box item above shows the pictures and the amounts of the leaders as appearing in the magazine.More than the slush money charge it is the family's silence about it, which is baffling. The number one magazine in Switzerland had made the damning charge that Rajiv Gandhi had left behind slush funds of $2.2 billion and yet the family has kept mum for 18 years now. How could any honest person tolerate such a serious charge? Well, one could say that the family might not have challenged it because it was published in far away Switzerland. But Dr Subramanian Swamy had included the Schweizer Illustrierte expose in his write-up “Do You know your Sonia?” in his party, the Janata Party, website, seven years ago, in 2002. It is still on the Party's website. Photocopies of the expose in the Swiss magazine are shown at pages 51 to 53 of Dr Swamy's write-up; also an e-mail from the magazine addressed to Dr Swamy on February 22, 2002 at page 50. The e-mail confirms what the magazine had reported.The e-mail reads:“Dear sir,We refer to your e-mail of April 4, regarding an article in our magazine Schweizer Illustrierte of November 11, 1991. In this article — Fluchgelder - Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren — is Rajiv Gandhi named with tot 2.5 Milliarden CHF on secret accounts. If you want the magazine please indicate the exact address.Yours faithfully,Ringer Ltd.Margot Todisco”.The fax and telephone numbers of Margot Todisco are also given in the mail. The e-mail is in box alongside here. Yet no one from the Congress or from the family has sued Dr Swamy till date, nor challenged him. The Swiss expose also prominently figured in the advertisement that some NRIs had put out in the New York Times to protest against Sonia Gandhi when she visited the US in the year 2007. The Indian National Overseas Congress (INOC) filed a defamation case against the ad, expressly "not to defend itself, but Sonia Gandhi". The New York Supreme Court dismissed the case holding that only Sonia Gandhi, not the INOC, had the locus to sue. But she would not dare sue. Thus, neither in Switzerland where Schweizer Illustrierte exposed Rajiv's secret account with billions 18 years ago in 1991, nor in India where Dr Swamy had put it on his party's website seven years ago in 2002, or in the US where the NRIs had boldly advertised the expose two years ago in 2007, would the Gandhi family challenge the expose.In criminal law the conduct of the accused is an important piece of evidence. What does the family's conduct show here excepting that it has something to hide.Second: family benefited from KGB, says bookThe second expose, Rajiv Gandhi figuring again, is that the first family of the Congress accepted political payoffs from the Russian spy outfit, the KGB. In a highly acclaimed book The State Within a State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia-Past, Present, and Future by Yevgenia Albats, a journalist on Moscow News and Izvestia, the author writes: “A letter signed by Victor Chebrikov, who replaced Andropov as the KGB head in 1982, noted: the USSR KGB maintains contact with the son of the Premier Minister Rajiv Gandhi (of India). R Gandhi expresses deep gratitude for the benefits accruing to the prime minister's family from the commercial dealings of the firm he controls in co-operation with the Soviet Foreign trade organisations. R Gandhi reports confidentially that a substantial portion of the funds obtained through this channel are used to support the party of R Gandhi.” (p223) The author also cites the KGB letter and file reference. In Dr Swamy's write-up on Sonia, KGB’s letter in Russian is attached at page 45 and its English translation at pages 43 and 44.The letter says that Rajiv Gandhi himself has admitted that “benefits” accrued to “the prime minister’s family” from commercial dealings through Russian co-operation. All major newspapers, The Hindu and Times of India included, had carried the expose on KGB payments. The book State within a State on KGB was published in 1994.Yet, no one from the Gandhi family has challenged it for 15 years now. Dr Swamy had included it in his expose on Sonia on his party's website since 2002. Yet the family has not challenged him or sued him for seven years. It was again made part of the NRI advertisement in New York Times in 2007 when Sonia Gandhi visited the US.Even then only a proxy case was filed to defend Sonia Gandhi's reputation which was promptly saying only Sonia could defend her honour, which she would not.
<img class="image_none" height="54" width="216">
S Gurumurthy
First Published : 30 Apr 2009 12:41:00 AM IST
Last Updated : 30 Apr 2009 05:15:34 PM IST
Mrs Antonia Maino (aka Sonia) Gandhi has finally broken her silence on the Indian slush money abroad. She told her party workers in Mangalore on April 27, 2009 that "the Congress was taking steps to address the issue of untaxed Indian money in Swiss banks". The delayed response of the first family of the Congress party, troubled by the issue from the word go, is understandable. But, the Swiss money has already become an electoral issue. That is what has finally forced the family to speak so that the party is not any further seen as being in denial and cynical about the Indian slush funds abroad. It is the family's silence, and the party's denial, that turned the issue into an election agenda. Shorn of the allegations normal in election time, all that L K Advani had said on March 29 was this: 'Mr Prime Minister, vigorously take up the issue of Swiss type secret banking and tax havens in the G20 meeting of April 2'. Had the PM told Advani that that was precisely what he was intending to do, that would have been the end of the BJP effort to make an issue of it. A Congress party, unburdened by its first family's anxieties, would have done precisely that, particularly when elections are round the corner. But neither the PM nor the party officials would dare do that. Why? Read on for the underlying drives.The first family has other, perhaps bigger, reasons to worry, apart from about the Bofors slush money. Two more stunning exposures — but not as well-known as the Bofors scam — make the first family a target for investigation on slush money. Now on to the heart of the story which has three limbs.First: $2.2 billions in Rajiv's secret accounts, says Swiss magazineThe shocking exposure came from Switzerland itself. The most popular magazine of Switzerland, Schweizer Illustrierte, [dated November 11, 1991] did an expose of 14 politicians of developing nations who, it said, had stashed their bribes in Swiss banks. The title of the expose in German read “Fluchgelder — Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren”. In English it meant, “Curse of money — The Swiss bank accounts of the Dictators”. Rajiv Gandhi figured in the expose as one with slush funds in secret accounts. Schweizer Illustrierte is not some rag. It is the Number One Swiss magazine and sells some 2,10,000 copies. Its readership is 9,18,000 — some 15 per cent of Swiss adults. The magazine had mentioned specific amounts in secret Swiss accounts of different leaders with their pictures alongside.The report under the picture of Rajiv Gandhi, translated into English, read: "2.5 billion francs on the Indian secret accounts in Switzerland" of "Rajiv Gandhi, Indian". Today the amount of 2.5 billion Swiss Francs equals 2.2 billion US Dollars. But as Rajiv was no more by then, it must become the family inheritance. The other leaders captured by the magazine were: Suharto of Indonesia (25.5 billion), Haile Selassie of Ethiopia (22.5 billion), Mobutu of Zaire (6 billion), Shah Pehlvi of Iran (5.7 billion), Saddam Hussein of Iraq (800 million), and Nicolas Ceausescu of Romania (500 million). The figures of slush money mentioned were in milliarden (meaning ‘billions’) units of Swiss Francs. Had Rajiv been alive then, the expose would have caused a political tsunami in India.The box item above shows the pictures and the amounts of the leaders as appearing in the magazine.More than the slush money charge it is the family's silence about it, which is baffling. The number one magazine in Switzerland had made the damning charge that Rajiv Gandhi had left behind slush funds of $2.2 billion and yet the family has kept mum for 18 years now. How could any honest person tolerate such a serious charge? Well, one could say that the family might not have challenged it because it was published in far away Switzerland. But Dr Subramanian Swamy had included the Schweizer Illustrierte expose in his write-up “Do You know your Sonia?” in his party, the Janata Party, website, seven years ago, in 2002. It is still on the Party's website. Photocopies of the expose in the Swiss magazine are shown at pages 51 to 53 of Dr Swamy's write-up; also an e-mail from the magazine addressed to Dr Swamy on February 22, 2002 at page 50. The e-mail confirms what the magazine had reported.The e-mail reads:“Dear sir,We refer to your e-mail of April 4, regarding an article in our magazine Schweizer Illustrierte of November 11, 1991. In this article — Fluchgelder - Die Schweizer Konten der Dictatoren — is Rajiv Gandhi named with tot 2.5 Milliarden CHF on secret accounts. If you want the magazine please indicate the exact address.Yours faithfully,Ringer Ltd.Margot Todisco”.The fax and telephone numbers of Margot Todisco are also given in the mail. The e-mail is in box alongside here. Yet no one from the Congress or from the family has sued Dr Swamy till date, nor challenged him. The Swiss expose also prominently figured in the advertisement that some NRIs had put out in the New York Times to protest against Sonia Gandhi when she visited the US in the year 2007. The Indian National Overseas Congress (INOC) filed a defamation case against the ad, expressly "not to defend itself, but Sonia Gandhi". The New York Supreme Court dismissed the case holding that only Sonia Gandhi, not the INOC, had the locus to sue. But she would not dare sue. Thus, neither in Switzerland where Schweizer Illustrierte exposed Rajiv's secret account with billions 18 years ago in 1991, nor in India where Dr Swamy had put it on his party's website seven years ago in 2002, or in the US where the NRIs had boldly advertised the expose two years ago in 2007, would the Gandhi family challenge the expose.In criminal law the conduct of the accused is an important piece of evidence. What does the family's conduct show here excepting that it has something to hide.Second: family benefited from KGB, says bookThe second expose, Rajiv Gandhi figuring again, is that the first family of the Congress accepted political payoffs from the Russian spy outfit, the KGB. In a highly acclaimed book The State Within a State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia-Past, Present, and Future by Yevgenia Albats, a journalist on Moscow News and Izvestia, the author writes: “A letter signed by Victor Chebrikov, who replaced Andropov as the KGB head in 1982, noted: the USSR KGB maintains contact with the son of the Premier Minister Rajiv Gandhi (of India). R Gandhi expresses deep gratitude for the benefits accruing to the prime minister's family from the commercial dealings of the firm he controls in co-operation with the Soviet Foreign trade organisations. R Gandhi reports confidentially that a substantial portion of the funds obtained through this channel are used to support the party of R Gandhi.” (p223) The author also cites the KGB letter and file reference. In Dr Swamy's write-up on Sonia, KGB’s letter in Russian is attached at page 45 and its English translation at pages 43 and 44.The letter says that Rajiv Gandhi himself has admitted that “benefits” accrued to “the prime minister’s family” from commercial dealings through Russian co-operation. All major newspapers, The Hindu and Times of India included, had carried the expose on KGB payments. The book State within a State on KGB was published in 1994.Yet, no one from the Gandhi family has challenged it for 15 years now. Dr Swamy had included it in his expose on Sonia on his party's website since 2002. Yet the family has not challenged him or sued him for seven years. It was again made part of the NRI advertisement in New York Times in 2007 when Sonia Gandhi visited the US.Even then only a proxy case was filed to defend Sonia Gandhi's reputation which was promptly saying only Sonia could defend her honour, which she would not.