THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The privileges and ethics committee of the state assembly that probed the breach of privilege allegation against finance minister T M Thomas Isaac has given him a clean chit in the comptroller and auditor general (CAG) report leaking controversy. The panel submitted its report in the assembly on Wednesday, with dissent notes from opposition members V S Sivakumar, Mons Joseph and Anoop Jacob.
The committee observed that the finance minister has done nothing wrong and has not violated the Official Secrets Act as claimed by the opposition. V D Satheesan of Congress had given the breach of privilege notice against the finance minister, alleging that the minister had leaked the report to the media before tabling it in the House.
“Whatever the FM said against CAG were facts. CAG has in fact violated rules. CAG created a wrong precedence and an unusual situation was created. This is the first in the history of the state that CAG has created such a situation,” observed the ethics committee headed by MLA A Pradeep Kumar.
Satheesan had contended that Isaac infringed on the rights of the House by disclosing the details of the audit report of KIIFB. On this, the committee observed that the report becomes part of the House only after it is tabled in the assembly.
The committee also quoted the report of the privileges and ethics committee of the Rajya Sabha for this. The 65th report of this committee in the Rajya Sabha observed that it cannot be considered as breach of privilege if the details of the CAG report are leaked before it is tabled in the House.
The committee said a constitutional body like CAG did not give any hints to the state government about remarks made against KIIFB in its initial draft report. “The accusations levelled by V D Satheesan that it was breach of privilege by the finance minister by leaking details of the report before it was tabled in the assembly has no locus standi. However, the committee observes very seriously that CAG has violated rules as claimed by the finance minister,” said the ethics committee report.