Moily defends PM, says he acted swiftly to cancel Devas deal

Chennai, Feb 7: Defending Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the Antrix-Devas deal issue, Union Corporate Affairs Minister Veerappa Moily today said the former never wanted tohide anything and had acted swiftly and scrapped the pact.

"...Now things are coming out...Two committees wereappointed by the Prime Minister. He never wanted to hide anything", Moily said reacting to BJP questioning Singh's'silence' on the issue in the backdrop of the blacklisting of four scientists, including former ISRO chief G Madhavan Nair.

As soon as the scam surfaced, the Prime Minister appointed two committees to look into it and annulled the deal after getting the opinion of the law minister, he said replying toquestions from reporters on the sidelines of a function here.

Moily, however, admitted that "somewhere you know therewas no proper handling" but asserted the Prime Minister couldnot be blamed for it. He was speaking after inaugurating a conference on"Investor's Meet" organised by Ministry of Corporate Affairsand Institute of Chartered Accounts of India here.

PTI