Three top retired military officials, Lieutenant General Qazi, as minister for railways, Lieutenant General Saeed-uz-Zafar, a chairman Pakistan Railways, and Lieutenant General Butt, as general manager administration, were the main figures behind the deal.
A subcommittee of PAC, headed by 'retired colonel' MNA Ghulam Rasool Sahi of the ruling party took on Friday the decision on the plea that the "mistake" these generals made was in 'good faith'.
After hearing the arguments from the ministry, Sahi said: "Though there was misconduct in the procurement of locomotives, the then administration had done this in good faith; therefore, this issue stands settled."
On Thursday, too, another subcommittee, headed by the same retired colonel, issued a mild directive and almost cleared some military officials, including a retired brigadier, in a Rs 12 million kickbacks case.
The way the PAC dealt with the corruption cases involving army high-ups in various capacities showed how unbridled an 'invisible military rule' in Pakistan could be, and it is rather impossible to challenge their 'legacy', political circles commented.
The subcommittee could not muster courage to fix liabilities against these generals even after Secretary Railways Shakeel Durrani had told the meeting in categorical terms that serious violations of rules were committed in the procurement of the locomotives.
"Had I been chairman, railways, at that time, I would have never gone for such a deal," Durrani said. Pakistan had struck a $98 million deal to procure 69 locomotives from China, back in 2002 when a former Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) chief, Lieutenant General Javed Ashraf Qazi, was minister for railways.
The deal turned sour when Chinese locomotives developed serious faults after some time and the media started pointing out some irregularities in the procurement process.
The PAC then took a suo motu action of the matter and summoned the top management of Railways Ministry.
The PAC formed a three-member subcommittee to probe the matter when Railways Ministry told the first meeting that the then minister, Qazi, took the proposed deal through a National Security Council (NSC).