NEW DELHI, Jan 28:
A special court today said that it would hear on February 3 the arguments on bail plea of former Telecom Secretary Shyamal Ghosh, who was chargesheeted by CBI in the additional spectrum allocation scam case of 2002 along with three telecom firms.
The case came up for hearing before Special CBI Judge O P Saini and the agency supplied the copies of the charge sheet and documents filed along with it to the accused.
CBI’s prosecutor K K Goel told the court that the agency would file a reply on the bail plea of Ghosh.
“Put up for scrutiny (of documents) and reply, if any, and disposal of bail application (of Ghosh) on February 3,” the judge said.
The court was earlier informed that the Supreme Court has quashed the order summoning Bharti Cellular Ltd CMD Sunil Bharti Mittal and Essar Group promoter Ravi Ruia as accused in the case.
The hearing in the case was virtually stalled since April 26, 2013 interim order of the Supreme Court which had said that proceedings against Mittal and Ruia, who had challenged trial court’s summoning order, will remain “postponed” until further orders.
The apex court had recently cleared the decks in the case by setting aside the lower court’s order summoning Mittal and Ruia, observing that principle of ‘alter ego’ has wrongly been applied by the trial judge in seeking presence of both the top corporate honchos as accused.
Besides Mittal, Ruia and Shyamal Ghosh, the special court had also summoned Canada-based NRI Asim Ghosh, who was then a managing director of accused firm Hutchison Max Telecom Pvt Ltd, as accused.
Mittal, Ruia and Asim Ghosh were not named as accused in the CBI charge sheet.
CBI had filed the charge sheet in the case on December 21, 2012 against Shyamal Ghosh and three telecom firms — Bharti Cellular Ltd, Hutchison Max Telecom Pvt Ltd (now known as Vodafone India Ltd) and Sterling Cellular Ltd (now known as Vodafone Mobile Service Ltd).
CBI had chargesheeted them as accused in the case relating to the Department of Telecommunications allocating additional spectrum which had allegedly resulted in a loss of Rs 846 crore to the exchequer.
In the 57-page charge sheet, CBI has booked Shyamal Ghosh and the three firms for the offences of criminal conspiracy (120-B) of the IPC and under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act. (PTI)
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