New Delhi - India's opposition parties on Tuesday strongly criticized the government's decision to strike off Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi, allegedly involved in the Bofors guns payoff case, from a list of wanted persons. Quattrocchi is the lone surviving suspect in the arms scandal case from the mid-1980s when the Rajiv Gandhi government finalised a 1.3-billion-dollar deal with Sweden's AB Bofors company to supply the Indian army with 400 Howitzer Field 155 MM guns.

The case revolves around bribes of 640 million rupees (then 14.2 million dollars) allegedly made by Bofors to Indian leaders and businessmen to win the Howitzer contract.

The Indian Express newspaper reported Tuesday that Quattrocchi no longer figured on India's Central Bureau of Investigation's list of wanted persons and had also been taken off the notices section of Interpol's website.

The Gandhis, Rajiv, who was assassinated in 1991, and his Italian-born widow Sonia Gandhi, now Congress Party president, were allegedly close to Quattrocchi.

Rajiv Gandhi was cleared of involvement in the Bofors case by a court in 2004.

The Congress Party leads India's ruling coalition and opposition leaders described the move to drop Quattrocchi from the wanted list as politically motivated.

Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader LK Advani said his party would examine the Quattrocchi issue if it came to power. "This is the last nail in the coffin of the judicial process in respect of the Bofors scandal," he said.

He also accused the Congress party of using institutions like the Central Bureau of Investigation for its own ends.

Congress party spokesman Abhishek Manu Singhvi said: "Bofors is a dead horse which the BJP has tried to flog in several elections and has not succeeded." (dpa)