Battling charges that high-value bandwidth was given to a private company without any competitive bidding and at throwaway prices by the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro), the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) on Tuesday sought to defend the government saying that no decision on allocating S-band spectrum to either Antrix (it’s the commercial arm of Isro) or Devas (the private company) has been taken.
Simultaneously, Isro announced on Tuesday that the process for the termination of the deal signed in between Antrix and Devas has already been initiated and that no financial losses have been suffered by the government owing to the Antrix-Devas deal. It also stated that the agreement was finalised at the level of the Antrix board in 2005 though the space agency “has not given either the spectrum or the satellite transponders to Devas or Antrix so far”.
With the Opposition including the BJP and the Left sharpening its knives further and continuing its scathing attack on the government today, the PMO in a statement issued on Tuesday was also forced to clarify that since no decision on spectrum allocation has been taken, “the question of revenue loss does not arise and any such reports are without any basis, in fact.”
Department of space secretary and Isro chief K. Radhakrishnan along with former Isro chief and presently Planning Commission member K. Kasturirangan addressed a press conference during which he maintained that no financial loss has been incurred by the government — the allegations are that this deal led to a revenue loss of `2 lakh crore rupees.
To a specific question on whether the Cabinet was informed about the Antrix-Devas agreement, Dr Radhakrishnan said “ideally we should have mentioned, but we did not”.
Asked why there was no bidding process before the agreement, he said, “it was a question of developing a new and novel service”.
Dr Radhakrishnan also said that the Antrix-Devas deal was recommended to be annulled in 2010 and the contract that was signed between Antrix and Devas “is already under review by the department of space” and at present “the process of annulment is on” following a review by the space commission in July 2010.