काले धन के मित्र, जनक और दार्शनिक हैं चिदंबरम।

ETHICS & POWER
RAM JETHMALANI


Friend, father & philosopher of black money is Chidambaram

साभार-
www.sunday-guardian.com/profile/ram-jethmalani
Tuesday 20th August 2019

Palaniappan Chidambaram, whom I shall for the sake of brevity call just Chidambaram, is
best seen through black and white. And please don't get me wrong and accuse me of racism.
I refer not to epidermis or mane, but to the economic colour of money. Some of his greatest
contributions to the economy of India are his brilliant pioneering initiatives for changing the
colour of money from black to white. And this passion has never left him.
Many of us have forgotten the Voluntary Disclosure of Income Scheme (VDIS) 1997, which he
announced when he was Finance Minister with the United Front government, granting income-tax
defaulters indefinite immunity from prosecution under the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act,
1973, Income Tax Act, 1961, Wealth Tax Act, 1957, and Companies Act, 1956, in exchange of
self-valuation and disclosure of income and assets. The scheme was brilliantly conceived.
While all schemes in the past valued declared assets at current prices, VDIS 1997 brought
in an arbitrary date of 1 April 1987. Gold and silver hoarders, and large property holders got
an exceptional bonanza on this valuation system. Further, proof of purchase was not insisted
upon, which gave complete freedom to the confessors to fudge any date they wanted to their
own financial advantage and further plunder of the country. So, even if gold was bought after
1987, it could be shown as having been bought before 1987, and it was a win-win game for all
stakeholders to rake in the cuts. The Comptroller and Auditor General of India condemned the
scheme in his report as abusive and a fraud on the genuine taxpayers of the country. But the
issue was forgotten, and the illustrious career of Palaniappan Chidambaram rose to greater
heights in the UPA regime.
Those were his innocent days. What a long way he has come since the era when he was cooking
up VDISs, so utterly transparent, that the loopholes and avenues to give relief to the looters
stared you in the face. The world economy was also then a little simpler than it is today, and his
best achievement was getting caught about his investments in Fairgrowth, which was involved in
the Securities Scam of 1992. Chidambaram had to resign for this utterly transparent investment
in a company whose scam would have paid rich dividends. Unfortunately, he was not Finance
Minister at the time and did not have the machinery to hush things up, and could only remotely
control the markets, unlike his present capabilities as former Finance Minister and thereafter.
Being Finance Minister in the UPA government was his finest hour. He could fiddle around with

share markets, capital markets, banks, financial instruments, such as, securities, participatory
notes, tax treaties, not to speak of spectrum sale, and use his extraordinary innovative powers of
black money magic to plunder our country with complete impunity. He assiduously cultivated the
media with his clipped English accent (that led him down, now and then), occasional freebies,
and sustained shadows of the Enforcement Directorate that he commanded.
hidambaram cannot get black money out of his blood. Dr Subramanian Swamy has clearly
stated in his website, "I now have further information from my usually reliable sources in the
Union Government that the tapping of Finance Minister Mr. Pranab Mukherjee and his close
associate in the Ministry, enabled Mr. Robert Vadra the son-in-law of Ms. Sonia Gandhi and Mr.
Karthik son of Mr. P. Chidambaram, to use the data thereby collected to manipulate and rig the
Mumbai stock market. Earlier these data were directly provided by the then Finance Minister Mr.
Chidambaram. I demand that the SEBI be asked by PM to initiate 'Insider Trading' investigation
and prosecution of Mr. Vadra and Mr. Karthik."
If what is put out by Dr Subramanian Swamy is false why doesn't Chidambaram sue him?
The dark clouds of the 2G scam and the repeated evidence being given by A. Raja and other
accused of his tacit involvement and other acts of omission and commission are menacingly
closing in on Chidambaram. He is losing his cool, and more importantly, losing his carefully
clipped English accent to its more indigenous roots more often. And like his colleague Digvijay
Singh, his mind seems to be disintegrating to a stage where he has started talking gibberish.
Take this, for example: in reply to the BJP demand for his resignation for his involvement in the
2G scam, Chidambaram claims that the BJP is targeting him since he initiated a probe by the
NIA into Hindu terror. Can any rational person see the connection between the two?
Take also his comments regarding the recent Mumbai blasts. As Home Minister, instead of
taking stock of the situation, and providing leadership, the only intelligent thing he could think of
saying was, "No intelligence is not intelligence failure." Even a college debating society expects
better logic. It's something like saying "illness is not a failure of health" or "impotence is not a
failure of potency".
Chidambaram's special financial skills have diversified into electoral politics also. He has
the distinction of having been declared defeated in the last Lok Sabha election, after which
he galvanized his special skills and local machinery, in particular, a data entry operator, and
doctored a marginal victory on the recount. That is quite a record for fraud. And can one forget
how the Indian Bank was cleaned up and left with only non-performing assets thanks to him and
his Tamil Maanila buddies?

Chidambaram's record as Home Minister has been disastrous. Neither has he made any impact
on internal security, with the worst massacres of his own paramilitary forces taking place in his
time, nor on terrorism, which carries on in complete complacency because there are neither
effective preventive or punitive systems in place, nor political will and national legislation to
combat terrorism. It is on record and in the public domain that the Home Ministry gave incorrect
names of India's most wanted list of terrorists allegedly hiding in Pakistan, some of whom were
tracked living in India or in custody. Is this a testament to his fabled efficiency and commitment?
What a laughing stock we must be before the world. It is almost as if India is determined that
it shall not combat terrorism, shall not have enabling legislation as enacted by the US, such as
the Homeland Security Act 2002, and the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 of UK and similar
legislations in European governments. India is determined not to have an effective national
agency on the lines of the Homeland Security Department of the US. The ramshackle National
Investigation Agency showed itself as a complete failure during the recent Mumbai attacks.
Understandable, because its only mandate appears to be to investigate "Hindu terror", the last
refuge for failed and hopeless Congressmen like Chidambaram. The CCTNS, JIC, ARC, NTRO
(presently in another scam), and NCTC remain effete, scattered and unmonitorable, even by the
Home Ministry. With such an unequivocal determination by the UPA government not to address
terrorism effectively, I can only grieve for my country.
Last modified: 09:29