NEW DELHI: Amid questions about the role of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) in allowing tainted Suresh Kalmadi to capture the reins of the Organising Committee for the 2010 Commonwealth Games, the government Tuesday put the onus for his appointment on the previous Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) regime.
Making a statement in the Lok Sabha, Youth Affairs and Sports Minister Ajay Maken said the NDA government had in 2003 begun the process which ultimately led to the appointment of Kalmadi as chairman of the Organising Committee (OC).
Maken, who also talked to reporters later, indicated that the current PMO could do nothing regarding Kalmadi’s appointment.
“There were two options. Either to scrap the Commonwealth Games or to go with the host city contract, which was signed by the NDA regime in November 2003. There was no third option,” he said.
In his statement, Maken said there was little the Congress-led government — formed a year after the NDA signed the bid document with the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) — could have done to stop Kalmadi’s appointment.
Maken’s statement came amid a leaked CAG report blaming the PMO for overlooking the objections raised by successive sports ministers against Kalmadi’s appointment.
“The original bid document had provided for a ‘government appointee’ as the chairman of the OC with the vice chairman being the IOA (Indian Olympics Association) president (Kalmadi). However, the bid document was inexplicably changed to delete the words ‘government appointee’ in respect of the chairman,” Maken told the Lok Sabha.The ‘legally obligatory’ contact was signed with the CGF in November 2003 by Kalmadi, he said.
“The contract, to which the government of India became a signatory in 2003, stipulated that the conduct of the Games will be entrusted to the Commonwealth Games Association of the host country, which in our case was the IOA,” he said.(IANS)
