Author: Agencies
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: October 8, 2010
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/694506/
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the government
to respond to the CAG report that has pointed out largescale irregularities
and favouritism allegedly by telecom minister A Raja in the Rs 70,000-crore
2G spectrum allocation scam in 2008.
A Bench comprising Justices G S Singhvi and
A K Ganguly asked Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium to go through the the
draft report which alleges the Ministry of Telecom ignored the advice of the
Law Ministry and the Prime Minister and allotted licenses by favouring "ineligible"
companies at lower rates on a first-cum-first basis - and also by arbitrarily
deciding the cut-off date.
The Bench posted the matter for October 22
without perusing the status reports filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation
and Enforcement Directorate into the investigations in the case.
It returned the reports filed in sealed covers
to both the agencies stating it will consider them during the next date of
hearing.
Raja was represented by senior advocate T
R Andhyarujina who was asked to be supplied with the copy of the CAG report.
Earlier, Subramanium said he would like to
allay any apprehension that investigations would not be fair. "We are
bound to conduct a fair investigation," he added.
He, however, said it would be premature to
say anything at this stage about the final conclusion of the investigations
in which more than one government agencies are involved.
The Solicitor General said the FIR relating
to the scam was registered against unnamed persons a year ago and the matter
has undergone judicial scrutiny in the Delhi High Court and the apex court.
"Today, we have a situation where coordination
is required between the CBI and other government agencies like ED, Income
Tax department and others," he submitted and pleaded that six months
time be granted for a comprehensive probe.
He said the transcript of the tape involving
telephonic conversations between several persons, including corporate lobbyist
Nira Radia and some journalists, have to be examined as it has a bearing on
the allocation of the 2G spectrum.
However, advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing
for the NGO which has alleged financial irregularities by Raja in connivance
with certain middlemen including Nira Radia, alleged the probe by CBI was
not fair as even after the registration of the FIR a year ago, none of the
persons have been interrogated or arrested.
He said neither Raja nor Radia has been interrogated
or arrested till now despite the taped conversation clearly throwing sufficient
light on their alleged involvement in the scam.
Further, the Income Tax officer, who was handling
the transcript of the tapped conversation and was coordinating with the CBI,
has been transferred, he alleged.
Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy, who
has sought the court's direction to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to sanction
prosecution of Raja for his alleged involvement in the 2G spectrum scam, said
he would prove the allegations made by him.
He said there are chances that the CBI probe
into the scam will be scuttled.
Bhushan supplied to the Bench the extract
of the CAG report mentioning that Swan Telecom owned by Reliance communication
benefited although it did not meet the eligibility criteria on the date of
the application.
According to the CAG report, the scam has
caused a loss of approximately Rs 1.40 lakh crore to the national exchequer.
He said the allegations made by the NGO Centre
for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) in the petition has been endorsed by
the CAG report that the prices were arbitrarily fixed at the rate which was
prevalent in 2001 for the spectrum allocation in 2008.
The CAG report has said there has been "consistent
favouritism to ineligible applicant" and "undue benefits to Reliance
Communication," he submitted.
The apex court is hearing two petitions on
the issue. The first petition was filed by CPIL on which notices were issued
to the Centre, Raja, CBI, ED and Income Tax department.
The second petition has been filed by Swamy
challenging the Delhi High Court order which rejected his plea to give direction
to the Prime Minister to grant sanction to prosecute Raja on the ground that
it was premature to pass any order as the investigation is being carried on
by CBI.
In response to the notices issued on the petition
of CPIL, CBI and ED have filed their affidavits stating they were not in a
position at this stage to confirm or deny charges that Raja was involved in
the alleged Rs 70,000-crore scam.
However, ED has said the investigations were
on against the companies that allegedly violated foreign exchange norms in
the 2008 award of telecom licences.
The Bench had on September 13 wanted to know
how CBI did not know against whom the investigations were on despite continuing
the process for several months and filing an FIR against unnnamed Telecom
Ministry officials.
Replying to this, the CBI had said it was
probing the matter in a "fair and impartial" manner and that it
was not in a position at this stage to deny or agree with the charges.
Reacting to the petition filed earlier this
month, Raja had said that the entire controversy was politically motivated.
Along with Raja, the names of certain public
servants, middlemen and Radia have surfaced for their alleged involvement
in the conspiracy for granting Unified Access Service (telecom) licences.
The ED affidavit said the alleged FEMA violations
by Loop Telecom and Essar Group was being looked into by the ED on the basis
of specific written complaints.
