New Delhi: The CBI yesterday registered a case against former chief of the Indian Air Force (IAF) S P Tyagi and 12 others for criminal conspiracy and fraud in the $750m deal for 12 VVIP helicopters.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) carried out raids at Air Chief Marshal (retd) S P Tyagi’s residence and several other places in Delhi, NCR and Chandigarh in connection with the case, sources said.
Tyagi is the first former chief of the IAF to be named by the CBI in a criminal case related to corruption. Apart from 13 people, an FIR was also registered against six companies: Italy-based Finmeccanica, Britain-based AgustaWestland, Mohali-based IDS Infotech Ltd (India), Chandigarh-based Aeromatrix India, Mauritius-based Infotech Design System and Tunisia-based IDS, sources said.
Sources said two new names, which were not part of the agency’s preliminary inquiry, have also been included in the FIR. They are Satish Bagrodia, brother of former union minister Santosh Bagrodia and Pratap Aggarwal, managing director of IDS Infotech. Those named in the FIR also include S P Tyagi’s brothers Julie, Docsa and Sandeep.
The FIR also names Giuseppe Orsi, former CEO of Italian defence major Finmeccanica; Bruno Spagnolini, former CEO of AgustaWestland (a Britain-based subsidiary of Finmeccanica), and alleged middlemen Guido Ralph Haschke, Karlo Valentino Ferdinando Gerosa and Christian Michel.
Sources said Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy), Section 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code and “some relevant sections” under Prevention of Corruption Act have been slapped in the FIR by the agency. They said raids took place at 14 locations including the residences of the Tyagi’s brothers and offices of IDS Infotech and Aeromatrix.
IANS
