Airbus deposited the money in NAC´s account at Himalayan Bank, said an NAC official. "We got the money back," he added.[break]
NAC officials had forwarded the account number on Tuesday amid growing pressure from the Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation and employees to recover the money. The account number was sent nearly a month after the manufacturer wrote to the NAC chairman asking account number so that the company could refund the money.
NAC had forwarded the commitment fee in October 2009, after deciding to buy two aircraft. However, the deal had landed into controversy after the parliament´s Public Accounts Committee and the Ministry of Finance found that the deal was made flouting the Public Procurement Act.
Following such findings, both the PAC and the Ministry of Finance had pushed the NAC to recover the money. The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority probed the case and even filed a case against then chairman of NAC Sugat Ratna Kansakar along with five other senior officials at the Special Court charging them of flouting procurement law and inflicting a loss of US$ 750,000 to the country.
Special Court had recently sent Kansakar into judicial custody after he failed to pay the bail ordered by the court.
NAC had responded to the Airbus letter three days ago, a day after special court´s decision to sent Kanskar to judicial custody.
MoTCA had instructed the NAC to forward its bank account number. NAC employees too were pressing the management for early recovery of the amount. Employees had protested the delay in taking initiation to recover the money. Addressing the employees, acting executive director of NAC had assured to take appropriate steps and later forwarded the bank account number requesting Airbus to deposit the amount.
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