New Delhi: The high-powered Chaturvedi committee to review the controversial Antrix-Devas deal on Saturday submitted its report to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Singh has asked Cabinet Secretary KM Chandrashekar to examine the report submitted by the committee comprising BK Chaturvedi and Roddam Narsimha and make recommendations on the follow-up action within 15 days.
"The Cabinet Secretary has been asked to submit his recommendations within 15 days," a PMO statement said.
The Cabinet Committee on Security, at a meeting on February 17, had recommended scrapping of the controversial deal under which ISRO's commercial arm Antrix had agreed to lease 90 per cent of scarce S-band space segment capacity on two satellites to private firm Devas for 12 years.
As per the CCS recommendation, Devas, which has former ISRO employees on its top management, was served a termination notice on February 25.
The CCS had cited requirement of the scarce space segment for strategic purposes, including for use of defence, para-military forces, railways and other public utility services.
While scrapping the controversial deal, the CCS also decided not to allot S-band space segment for commercial use and retained it solely for strategic and societal applications.
"The government will not be able to provide orbit slot in S-band to Antrix for commercial activities, including for those which are the subject matter of existing contractual obligations for S-band," Union Law minister M Verappa Moily had said after the meeting.
A week before the CCS meeting, the Prime Minister had constituted the two-member panel for review of technical, commercial, procedural and financial aspects of the deal.
It had also been asked to suggest correctives and fix responsibility for lapses if any and recommend improvements and changes in processes and procedures followed by Antrix, ISRO and Department of Space.
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