There were indications tonight that heads may roll in these departments after Attorney General Soli Sorabjee submits his report on the fiasco to Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. The PM has asked Sorabjee to affix bureaucratic responsibility for the ``poor drafting'' of the affidavit which forced the Government to reinstate Bezbaruah.

The main targets of the PM's ire appear to be Personnel Secretary Arvind Verma and Establishment Officer M Rajendra Nair who actually signed the controversial affidavit. However, others may come in the net too, depending on Sorabjee's findings.

Ironically, Verma was earlier accused by Urban Development Minister Ram Jethmalani of ``misleading'' the Government on the CVC ordinance which was today challenged in the Supreme Court. The same Bench which dealt with the Bezbaruah transfer case has now asked the Government to reply on the CVC issue.

Jethmalani wrote a letter to the PM slamming Verma and the bureaucracy for withholding vital information on the Supreme Court directive for statutory status to the CVC. The points made by Jethmalani are echoed in Anil Divan's petition.

The PMO ignored Jethmalani's allegations for a month but now it appears to be pursuing the same line, blaming the bureaucracy for ``misleading'' it on the Bezbaruah issue.

Official sources said Sorabjee's brief is to pinpoint whether the omissions in the affidavit, over which the Supreme Court took umbrage, were deliberate or inadvertent. They sought to clarify that the Government had not asked the officials to omit anything and stated that the PM was ``very upset'' at what he sees as an attempt to pull the wool over his eyes.

The sources said that the case went against the Government the minute the Court spotted certain omissions in the affidavit. It said this amounted to ``misleading'' the court by ``completely rewriting'' the ruling in the hawala case.

Hurried consultations between Sorabjee, Vajpayee and Solicitor General Santosh Hegde, who appeared on behalf of the Government, last night resulted in the PMO voluntarily reinstating Bezbaruah.

For Vajpayee, the entire episode has been a personal humiliation. As Personnel Minister, he has to bear the brunt of the Court's ire. In addition, Bezbaruah's transfer blew up into a sordid controversy with AIADMK chief Jayalalitha flinging accusations of corruption at the PMO.