NEW DELHI: Former Telecom Minister A Raja had “arbitrarily” subverted procedures while giving approvals for dual technology licences to favour accused Swan Telecom Pvt Ltd (STPL), the CBI today claimed in a special court.
During the final arguments in 2G spectrum allocation case, special public prosecutor Anand Grover said that Raja had not evolved any procedure which was to be followed while dealing with pending applications for dual technology, despite the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and Telecom Commission insisting on it.
“No procedure was evolved to allocate dual technology licence. A Raja subverted the procedures. Everybody else was saying that evolve a procedure, but Raja deliberately ignored them,” Grover told Special CBI Judge O P Saini.
“Without evolving any procedure, Raja gave approval to grant dual technology,” he said, asking that “a minister can approve it, but where was the procedure”.
He further argued that “the entire process has to be fair. It was the government, so the process must be fair. There was no public announcement about it. Raja approved it arbitrarily to favour certain applicants.”
Grover said that STPL was “ultimately favoured” in the entire process.
“No procedure was evolved by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT). Everybody, from TRAI to Telecom Commission, was saying that a procedure should be evolved. There was no public announcement,” he said.
“Without making it public, you are parting with the property of the state. This was done to favour certain people,” he said during the arguments which would continue tomorrow.
In its charge sheet, the agency has alleged that Tata Tele Services Ltd and Spice Communications, which were having priority over STPL in terms of the dual technology approvals, were “unreasonably deprived” of the allocation of spectrum for Delhi circle.
Raja, STPL and its promoters Shahid Usman Balwa and Vinod Goenka and 13 others are facing trial in the case. Raja and other co-accused have denied the allegations levelled against them by the CBI.
Besides Raja, Balwa and Goenka, DMK MP Kanimozhi, former Telecom Secretary Siddharth Behura, Raja’s erstwhile private secretary R K Chandolia, Unitech Ltd MD Sanjay Chandra and three top executives of Reliance ADAG – Gautam Doshi, Surendra Pipara and Hari Nair – are facing trial in the case.
Directors of Kusegaon Fruits and Vegetables Pvt Ltd Asif Balwa and Rajiv Agarwal, Kalaignar TV Director Sharad Kumar and Bollywood producer Karim Morani are also accused in the case, besides three telecom companies — Reliance Telecom Ltd, STPL and Unitech Wireless (Tamil Nadu) Ltd.
In its charge sheet, CBI had alleged a loss of Rs 30,984 crore to the exchequer in allocation of 122 licences for 2G spectrum, which was scrapped by the Supreme Court on February 2, 2012.
All the accused have denied the allegations levelled against them by CBI. (PTI)
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