Former CWG Organising Committee secretary general Lalit Bhanot, accused in the CWG scam, on Friday denied all the charges levelled against him by the CBI and said that there was no conspiracy in awarding the TSR contract to the Swiss company.
Advocate Ramesh Gupta, counsel for Bhanot, told special Judge Talwant Singh that, “Nothing can be more transparent on the part of organising committee as it had openly announced in its general assembly meeting, in 2009, that the TSR system contract is being given to Swiss Timing. A large number of foreigners were also present in that meeting. Nothing was kept secret so where is the conspiracy?”
“In all this, where is the conspiracy, dishonesty and maliciousness that involves Bhanot... A conspiracy is between a group of people and is not announced in public, but our decision was open in public. How can this be termed conspiracy?”, he said.
Besides Bhanot, Lok Sabha MP Suresh Kalmadi and nine others have been chargesheeted by the CBI under various Sections of the IPC and the Prevention of Corruption Act for illegally awarding the contract to install TSR system for the 2010 games to Swiss Timing, causing a loss of over `90 crore to the exchequer.
Others accused in the case includes OC’s director general V K Verma, joint director general (sports) A S V Prasad, OC director general (procurement) Surjit Lal, treasurer M Jayachandran, promoters of Gem International P D Arya and A K Madan and A K Reddy of AKR Constructions.
According to the probe agency, the accused allegedly favoured the Swiss Timing and decided to give it the contract before it made the bid.