Opening an old case against Congress, the CBI has dispatched a judicial request to the United States seeking information from private investigator Michael Hershman, who had expressed willingness to share with Indian agencies crucial details about the ₹64 crore worth Bofors scam of the 1980s.
In 1990, the CBI registered a case, three years after a Swedish radio channel broke the scam alleging that ₹64 crore kickbacks were paid by Swedish firm Bofors AB to politicians and defence officials of India in the Rajiv Gandhi government to clinch the deal for 400 155 mm howitzer guns. Since then, the corruption charges became a black spot for the Gandhi family, with rival political parties often exploiting it to corner the Congress.
Head of the Fairfax Group, Hershman came to India in 2017 to attend a conference of private detectives. He, however, gave an interview to a news channel on October 17, 2017 saying that he was engaged by Union Ministry of Finance in 1986 to track money laundering and other violations of currency control laws by people abroad and creation of assets including by those involved in Bofors scam.
Subsequently the CBI reached out to the Ministry of Finance here but the file pertaining to Hershman’s engagement was not traceable given that it was too old. The CBI as a follow up reached out to Interpol for seeking the information from Hershman which is still pending.
The agency then went to a Special CBI court to seek its nod for issuing Letters Rogatory for fetching information from the US-based Fairfar Group chief after it got a go ahead from the Union Home Ministry on January 14 this year.
“It is requested that in order to collect both documentary as well as oral evidence, for ascertaining the fact relating to the claims made by Michael Hershman, in the above-mentioned interview, it is necessary to conduct investigation in the United States of America,” a special court had noted while clearing the CBI’s application for the issuance of the LRs.
Nod to the CBI
The Special Court gave nod to the CBI to ahead with LRs which is an instrument to seek information from other countries on criminal matters.
The need for Letters Rotatory arose because letters and reminders to the US authorities on November 8, 2023, December 21, 2023, May 13, 2024, and August 14, 2024, did not yield any information.
The CBI filed two chargesheets in 1999 and 2000. Four years later, the Delhi High Court exonerated Rajiv Gandhi, which was nearly 13 years after he was assassinated by the LTTE in a suicide attack in Tamil Nadu.
The CBI appealed against the 2005 decision in the apex court in 2018 but it was dismissed on the grounds of delay. The Supreme Court, however, allowed it to raise all the points in an appeal filed by advocate Ajay Aggarwal.
