Delhi Court to hear Bofors pay-off case today

New Delhi, Sep 8 (ANI): A Delhi court will hear the Bofors payoffs case against Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi today. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) may reveal its course of action following the withdrawal of Interpol's Red Corner Notice against him.

The matter is to come up for hearing before Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Kaveri Baweja.

During the brief hearing on April 30, Additional Solicitor General P P Malhotra, appearing for CBI, had informed the court that the Red Corner Notice issued against Quattrocchi was withdrawn in November last year.

The ASG had also sought two months time to decide on the future course of action in the politically-sensitive case on the court's query as to what options were left with the probe agency following the withdrawal of the Red Corner Notice.

The Bofors scandal was a major corruption scandal in India in the 1980s, when the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and several others were accused of receiving kickbacks from Bofors AB for winning a bid to supply the Indian Army with 155 mm howitzer guns.

The court had on February 10, 1997, sent letters to Malaysia and the UAE seeking the arrest and extradition of Quattrocchi.

The CBI had registered the FIR in the Bofors case on January 22, 1990, three years after Swedish Radio on April 16, 1987, claimed that A B Bofors, the makers of the 155 mm howitzers, had paid kickbacks to top Indian politicians and key defence officials to secure the Rs 1,437 crore gun deal.The contract between the Indian government and the Swedish Company for the supply of 400 field guns was signed on March, 24, 1986. (ANI)