New Delhi, February 14, 2013-As the VVIP helicopter deal threatened to shake the foundation of the UPA government, Mail Today cracked the murky and complicated payoff trail of 51 million Euro as disclosed in the report filed by the Italian investigators.
The report reveals that the Tyagi brothers – Julie, Docsa and Sandeep – related to former air chief S.P Tyagi received kickbacks of 100,000 Euro in cash. This was followed by several additional tranches of money, through fake engineering contracts with two companies – IDS India and IDS Tunisia – for bribing the corrupt Indian officials for facilitating the deal in favour of AgustaWestland choppers. The owners of these entities who received a massive 21 million Euro remain unknown. A total of 51 million Euro was paid in kickbacks for the deal.
According to the report, the invoices issued by IDS India and Tunisia “indicated in detail the giving of funds intended to reward the consultants and to remunerate India’s corrupt public officials.”
Besides the Tyagi brothers, middleman Christian Michel, allegedly engaged by the Italian company along with Guido Haschke for facilitating the deal, was separately paid 30 million Euro. Michel, reported directly to Finmeccanica boss Giuseppe Orsi. He was the second middleman employed by the company apart from Haschke. Michel, a consultant for AgustaWestland is the shadowy owner of global service Trade Commerce headquartered in London and global service Fez Dubai.
Timeline of the VIP Chopper deal
The middlemen have claimed that 60 per cent of the commission went to the Tyagi family and remaining were kept by the facilitators.
Ghost companies
The two companies – IDS India and IDS Tunisia – which may well be fronts for Tyagis and whose whereabouts and ownership are shrouded in mystery – raised several invoices for false operations in India. According to the report filed in the Italian court the company got monthly remittances to the tune of 510,000 Euro till December 2011 over last year.
The false liabilities of 977,263 Euro were shown in 2008. In 2009, 507,988 Euro were received on the basis of invoices for non-existent operations by IDS India.
