Observing that the "CAG is not a munim (accountant)" the Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a plea challenging the Comptroller and Auditor General's power to conduct performance audit of controversial allocation of coal blocks by the UPA government.
Communist party of India-Marxist leader Brinda Karat on Sunday said the letter from the Prime Minister's Office to Team Anna defending corruption allegations against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh does not give any clarity on the matter.
Chief Justice of India S H Kapadia on Saturday said loss is a matter of fact and profit and gain is a matter of opinion, remarks that came against the backdrop of raging controversies over valuation of natural resources.
Bharatiya Janjata Party veteran L K Advani's suggestion for a collegium to appoint Election Commissioners and Comptroller and Auditor General was on Tuesday backed by United Progressive Alliance ally Dravida Munetra Kazhagam and opposition Communist Party of India-Marxist.
The Comptroller and Auditor General has found gross financial mismanagement and irregularities in the implementation of the National Rural Health Mission at almost every level in Uttar Pradesh.
Lawyer Prashant Bhushan is likely to approach the Supreme Court next week to seek cancellation of the controversial allocation of coal blocks and an independent probe on the lines of the 2G spectrum allocation case he had filed. Bhushan said he is collecting documents regarding the coal block allocation, which the Comptroller and Auditor General has found fault with, and preparing a detailed complaint.
In a stinging attack on the Comptroller and Auditor General, the Congress on Monday alleged the government auditor was as much responsible as the Bharatiya Janata Party for the disruption of the just-concluded monsoon session of Parliament on the coal mine allocation issue.
Team Anna on Saturday clubbed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee with 13 other cabinet ministers, whom they accused of corruption, which the Congress dismissed as "unsubstantiated averments" that need not be responded to.
The company had initially objected to audit by CAG for time barred years as per Production Sharing Contract and had not accepted the 'exceptional circumstances' advanced by the ministry
Vicky Nanjappa accessed the CAG report on illegal mining in Karnataka and finds out that the in the face of losses worth thousands of crores, the state administration had only been able to recover just Rs 7.22 crore
The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) on Tuesday criticised the roles of the Department of Space and its former secretary, G Madhavan Nair, in the Antrix-Devas deal, saying the deal was a "classic case of public investment for private profit".
The Comptroller and Auditor General on Tuesday declined to join a public debate on the controversies over its findings on the coal blocks allocation, which have come under attack from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the Congress and critics.
Delhi airport has been losing money for the past six years because of the heavy interest burden on loans.
The Comptroller and Auditor General can do a performance audit of production sharing contracts
The United Progressive Alliance government in its robust defence has rubbished Comptroller and Auditor General's charges against the allotment of coal mines and its estimate of losses to the exchequer.
Even as the Bharatiya Janata Party paralyses Parliament on the allocation of coal blocks by the Centre, its own government in Chhattisgarh had come under attack from Comptroller and Auditor General for allocating coal blocks at 'abnormally low' rates that led to a loss of over Rs 1,052 crore.
The United Progressive Alliance is expected to put up a united face on Wednesday to counter opposition demand for resignation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over the Comptroller and Auditor General reports on coal block allocation and two other issues.
The Bharatiya Janata Partuy on Monday decided to aggressively demand the resignation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over the Comptroller and Auditor General report on the allocation of coal blocks and stall both Houses of Parliament on the issue on Tuesday.
In the dock over three new Comptroller and Auditor General reports, the government on Friday stressed that these were not final and accused the auditor of not following its mandate.
Against the backdrop of claims made by a former Comptroller and Auditor General official on its report on 2G spectrum, the government on Monday favoured a discussion in the Lok Sabha on the "serious" matter.
Former Comptroller and Auditor General official R P Singh, who has stirred a controversy, has rejected the allegations that the Congress has put him up to defend the government on the audit report on 2G spectrum allocation which had estimated the presumptive loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore.
Amid allegations and counter-allegations over the Comptroller and Auditor General's figure of presumptive losses in 2G allocation, Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari on Saturday demanded that the CAG explain the issue to clear the air over the matter.
United Progressive Alliance key ally Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on Monday strongly pitched for a multi-member Comptroller and Auditor General, saying the recent flopped auction of 2G spectrum that netted only about Rs 9,000 crore had proved wrong the top auditors' report pegging the presumptive loss in 2G allocation at Rs 1.76 lakh crore.
After attacking the Comptroller and Auditor General, Union Minister of State in PMO V Narayanasamy Sunday demanded an apology from Bharatiya Janata Party for "misleading" the people that the 2G spectrum allocation in 2008 had resulted in a loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore to the exchequer.
The Delhi High Court-appointed observer Justice (Retd) Mukul Mudgal said that a former Deputy Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) will look after the tender process for the fourth cricket Test between India and South Africa starting next month.
Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh took a dig at Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai on Thursday asking why does he not stop leak of reports from his office, a day after the latter deprecated the "brazenness" with which the decisions were being taken by the government.
'Governments have no business running temples. Governments certainly have no business deciding who is a Hindu and who is not a Hindu.'
Reliance Industries on Saturday said it had never contested the government's right to get the company's spending on KG-D6 gas fields audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General but hoped it will not be subjected to a performance audit."RIL has at no time contested the government's right to conduct an audit by any agency, including the CAG, as provided in Section 1.9 of the Accounting Procedure of the PSC," the company said in a statement on Saturday evening.
The auditor said that it has unfettered right of access to all records of Reliance Industries (RIL) during its audit of operations in the Krishna-Godavari basin and would override any conditions sought to be imposed on the process.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India had called an Entry Conference with RIL and the Oil Ministry on Wednesday to begin its second round of audit that is to cover RIL's spending on KG-D6 gas fields during 2008-09 to 2011-12.
Armed with the Comptroller and Auditor General report, opposition on Tuesday targeted Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over appointment of Suresh Kalmadi as Commonwealth Games Organising Committee chief.
With the Comptroller and Auditor General reportedly accusing Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit of irregularities in awarding certain Commonwealth Games contracts, the Delhi government on Wednesday stoutly rejected the allegations, saying she never "intervened to favour" any firm and all due processes were followed in finalising the contracts.
The Comptroller and Auditor General has pulled up Jammu and Kashmir forest ministry for allegedly diverting 1,883 hectares of forest land for non-forest purposes in violation of rules in Jammu district of the state.
Government auditor CAG has rapped five regulators, including Sebi, Irda and PNGRB, for keeping their surplus funds worth over Rs 2,142 crore collected through fee and penalty outside the government accounts.
Politics over its critical reports on scams echoed in the 150th anniversary celebrations of the Comptroller and Auditor General on Wednesday when Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Public Accounts Committee Chairman Murli Manohar Joshi praised Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee for defending both the CAG and the PAC when they came under attack.
Most senior scientists have complained of repeated questioning by the expenditure department, bureaucratic delays in clearances, more focus on procedure than on result and the lack of an environment for science to grow, reports Akshat Kaushal
The 2G controversy rocked Parliament's Public Accounts Committee meeting in New Delhi on Monday with opposition parties demanding that former director general (Audit) R P Singh be summoned and asked why he differs with the Comptroller and Auditor General on the quantum of loss. With differences persisting, the meeting was adjourned. The meeting scheduled for Tuesday has also been postponed reportedly as Chhath festival falls on that day.
After conducting a few pilot studies, the government is in the process of introducing a new accounting system in a phased manner that would provide an effective way to track and assess assets created out of public money.
Keeping up its attack on the Comptroller and Auditor General, the Congress on Thursday said the auditor was "not competent enough" to decide on the loss to the government in the coal block allocation issue "just on the basis of presumptions".The party also said that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was "clean" and no one could raise an accusing finger at him in the wake of the CAG report" and there has been "no error or wrongdoing".
With Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declaring that he will quit public life if corruption allegations are proved against him, Team Anna on Wednesday demanded an independent probe into the charges, saying they will be most happy if these are proved wrong.