NEW DELHI: Urging the apex court to dismiss a plea seeking perjury proceedings against public servants for allegedly misleading it during the Rafale hearing, the Centre on Thursday in an affidavit termed the plea by the petitioners as misconceived and stated the same is based on media reports.
In a reply affidavit submitted on the plea filed by former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie and lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan, the Centre said the allegations of making false statements and suppressing facts from the court were completely false and baseless.
“On facts as well, the contention of the petitioners that the officials of the answering respondent (the Centre) have made false statements and suppressed evidence while submitting information on ‘decision making process’, ‘offsets’ and ‘pricing’ pursuant to orders passed by this court is completely false, baseless and an attempt to intimidate government servants from performing their duty. On this ground alone, the application is liable to be dismissed,” the affidavit reads.
The affidavit comes a day ahead of the hearing by a SC bench on pleas seeking review of its December 14 verdict in the Rafale case.
“There is no act of perjury involved in the submissions made before the Supreme Court as the submissions are based on records,” the Centre stated, “The information provided to the court is after due approval of the competent authorities based on records, documents and decisions.”
Meanwhile, Bhushan filed his rejoinder in response to the Centre’s affidavit in which the government said that categorical and emphatic findings recorded by the SC in its verdict have no apparent error warranting the review. “It is clear that the government misled the court on various counts in the notes that were submitted in a sealed cover.,” he said.