Report states Nair bypassed system

Isro row spirals: Space panel and Union Cabinet kept in dark about deal

One of the most serious procedural lapses in the controversial Antrix-Devas deal is the complete bypassing of the INSAT Coordination Committee (ICC) system, which is mandated to approve each and every Indian Space Research Organisation’s (Isro) deal with private firms.

“The ICC set up in 1977 for the overall management of the INSAT System had not met since 2004. ICC was the body for recommending the utilisation of satellite capacities by non-government users.
“Earmarking GSAT capacity for Devas without consulting ICC was a clear violation of the government policy,” said a report of the probe panel headed by former chief vigilance commissioner Pratyush Sinha.

Overlooked

“The requirements of ICC were completely overlooked by the Secretary, Department of Space (G Madhavan Nair) and Director SATCOM (A Bhaskar­anarayana) who were the chairman and secretary of the committee (ICC) respectively,” said the first Antrix-Devas review panel consisting of B K Chaturvedi, former Cabinet secretary and Roddam Narsimha, former director of National Aerospace Laboratories, Bangalore.

Isro released both reports in the public domain on Saturday night.

The Space Commission approved the GSAT-6 project in May 2005 and the Union Cabinet’s nod came in 2005. Four years later, the Space Commission approved a follow-up project, GSAT-6A.
But the Space Commission and the Cabinet were not informed of the Antrix-Devas agreement or its implications for usage of spectrum for defence or security purposes.

The proposals were not authorised by the ICC and in the Technical Advisory Group of ICC, a brief mention was made in October 2004 but no approval was sought.

The agreement signed with Devas had several weaknesses and loaded heavily in favour or Devas.
“While Isro was to invest about Rs 800 crore in two satellites and their launches, it provided 90 per cent of the satellite capacity for Devas and the use of 60 MHz of S-band spectrum in the 2500-2690 MHz band,” said the Chaturvedi panel.

This left very little spectrum with Isro for any strategic or societal use in future and defence requirements were not fully considered.

A section of the report has not been disclosed ostensibly due to security reasons.

“The spectrum allocated for Devas project seems disproportionately large considering that reportedly in theUSA, Korea and Japan, 20-25 MHz of spectrum in this band had been used for similar services,” the Chaturvedi committee said.

Commission nod

While the Union Cabinet and Space Commission were kept in the dark about the existing agreement with Devas while seeking their approval, in October 2009, Isro received the Space Commission’s nod for the follow on satellite GSAT 6A.

But the approval was sought for only Rs 147 crore for satellite fabrication excluding the insurance and launch cost, which kept the financial ceiling under the Rs 150 crore mark above which Cabinet approval is mandatory.

“The choice of Forge Advisors (as technical partner in Satellite Digital Multimedia Broadcast service) is a grey area. Isro took a risk in selecting FA-USA and planning its satellite launch on unproven technological capabilities. While the Antrix board approved the proposal, primary responsibility lay with secretary, Department of Space for this decision,” it said.