New Delhi:
Amid a war of words between the government and the Opposition over the recent reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), particularly on coal block allocations in which the auditor indicted the government, Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram today stressed on the important role played by auditors.
Addressing the Conference of Accountants General Auditors' conference in New Delhi, Mr Chidambaram took the opportunity to clear the air on the apparent virtual war between the government and the CAG.
"Unfortunately, however, some dissonance has crept into the public discourse and for reasons which are inexplicable, the CAG and the government have been cast as adversarial to each other. Perhaps this in the nature in the functions of the government and CAG," Mr Chidambaram said.
"The CAG should look at expenditure and misuse of funds, it has the right to ask whether there has been any laxities in following the policies. The government looks at the CAG's report on expenditure reports so that it can meet its budgeting targets," Mr Chidambaram said.
Emphasising that there is a need to strengthen public accountability, Mr Chidambaram also said that the CAG and the government were not adversaries.
His comments come a day after the Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai, addressing the conference, said that they are not cheerleaders of the government.
"We, however, cannot don the role of cheerleaders. We strive to provide objective feedback on the functioning of the various departments of the government," Mr Rai said.
"In this process, we have proactively engaged with ministries in providing our input. This approach is based on the fundamental premise that public audit is as much a partner in upgrading governance as any other department in government," he said.
The recent reports of the CAG have exposed the government to allegations of deep-ridden graft. For telecom and coal, the auditor said that an auction should have been held to ensure fair play while allocating spectrum and mine leases. The CAG estimates that the telecom scam cost the country 1.76 lakh crores, and the coal swindle another 1.86 crores. The prime minister was in charge of the Coal Ministry for a major part between 2004 and 2009.
These reports had come under sharp attack from the government with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh describing them as "disputable and flawed".
(With PTI inputs)