Bofors yet to be proved a scandal, says President Pranab Mukherjee

According to him, the whole controversy was more of a media trial

President Pranab Mukherjee, in an interview to Swedish Daily Dagens Nyhetter, has said the Bofors gun deal is yet to be established as a scandal by the Indian judiciary, and the whole controversy was more of a media trial.

NDTV.com quoted Mukherjee as saying, “I was the defence minister of the country long after Bofors, and all my generals certified that this is one of the best guns we are having. Till today, Indian Army is using it. The so-called scandal which you talk of, yes, in the media, it was there. There was a media trial. But I'm afraid, let us not be too much carried by publicity.”

Before becoming President in 2012, Mukherjee had headed the defence and finance ministries across several Congress and UPA governments. In 1986, he was the Union defence minister, when Swiss arms manufacturer Bofors sealed a Rs 1,500-crore contract to supply 155-mm Howitzer guns to India. The Swedish media had reported that the company had to pay massive kickbacks to Indian politicians and defence officials. The media furore and analysis around the case cost the Congress and then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi the general elections in 1989.

The President, when asked if he believed the controversial arms deal was a mere media scandal, said, “I do not know. I'm not describing it, you're putting that word. Don't put that word. What I am saying is that in media it was publicised. But up to now, no Indian court has given any decisive verdict about the alleged scandal.”  

The Scandal

The first hints of a ‘scandal’ was dropped by a Swedish radio broadcast in 1987, which talked of massive backhand sums paid to Indian politicians and defense officials, by AB Bofors. This revelation was followed by an investigation by a team of journalists from The Hindu, under editor N Ram and correspondent Chitra Subramaniam. Subramaniam went on to secure nearly 350 documents detailing the pay-off of over Rs 64 crores to some major players in Indian politics and defence. At the centre of it all featured the name of Ottavio Quattrocchi, an Italian businessman representing Italian petrochemicals firm Snamprogetti. Quattrocchi had recently become a powerful broker between New Delhi and international businesses owing to his reported proximity to the Gandhi family.  

While the media furor caused a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) to be set up on August 6, 1987, and the Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress to lose the 1989 elections, the formal case registered by CBI in 1990 slackened after Rajiv’s assassination in 1991. 

In 1999, even as the Indian government lifted its blacklist from Bofors, CBI filed a formal charge sheet against Quattrocchi, Win Chadha, Rajiv Gandhi, the defence secretary S. K. Bhatnagar and a number of others.

The Delhi High court went on quash the charges of bribery against Rajiv Gandhi and others in 2002, but the decision was reversed by the Supreme Court in 2003. By 2006, even as CBI waited for a long appealed extradition orders for Quattocchi, he was arrested by the Interpol in Argentina and released on bail. His passport however was impounded and he was not allowed to leave the country. India also lost the Extradition case in Argentina Supreme court, for lack of key evidences.

A Delhi court provided temporary relief for Quattrocchi from the case, for lack of sufficient evidence against him, on 4 March 2011. However the case is still going on.

On 12 July 2013, Quattrochi died of a heart attack in Milan. 

Despite the controversy, the Bofors gun was used extensively as the primary field artillery during the Kargil War with Pakistan and gave India 'an edge' against Pakistan according to battlefield commanders

Meanwhile, current Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, while refusing to comment on the President's statement, defended the Bofors guns, saying they are of good quality.