Moily to PM: Didnt mean to belittle CAG

Explaining the functioning of the Comptroller and Auditor Generals office,Union Law Minister M Veerappa Moily has written to PM Manmohan Singh.

Explaining his recent remarks about the functioning of the Comptroller and Auditor Generals office,Union Law Minister M Veerappa Moily has written to PM Manmohan Singh that he had no intention of indicting or belittling the CAG when he said it has not exactly fulfilled what the Indian Constitution makers had in mind while creating the institution.

On September 13,Moily had made a speech in which he questioned the functioning of the institution of the CAG. He was asked by the PM to send his comments after Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai protested against the ministers observations.

In his letter to the PM,however,Moily is learnt to have pointed out that the Fifth Pay Commission had also talked of the need for a concurrent audit so as to check scandals and scams. He is also learnt to have asserted that CAG should look beyond its restricted area of operation and that there is a need for some reforms in such institutions.

Incidentally,inaugurating a training programme for 45 auditors from the apex auditing bodies of 36 countries the same day Moily made his speech,CAG Rai had wondered if the auditors should question a particular government policy or suggest policy alternatives.

In his speech,Moily had said the CAGs timely intervention could have prevented many scams and scandals. Scandals and scams are known even when they are being planned and executed. If audit draws attention to them forthwith in a well-published manner,such scandals can be halted mid-stride. Postmortems are good but they can be conducted only when a patient is dead, he had added,quoting from the report of the Fifth Pay Commission.

The CAG,designed to be a bulwark against omissions and commissions of the Executive under the supervision of the Legislature,Moily said,had not fulfilled the job for what it was conceptualised by the Constitution-makers.