Court discharges ex-Telecom Secy in spectrum allocation scam, says CBI

A special court today gave a clean chit to a former top bureaucrat, and three telecom firms, in the 2002 additional spectrum scam, saying that, the investigating agency, CBI, had filed a “false and fabricated” chargesheet against the accused. “I would request my good friend Jaitley to check with the CBI, if I have ever spoken to them about this case”, Sibal told the media here.

CBI had filed the chargesheet in the case in December 2012 against former telecom secretary Shyamal Ghosh and three telecom firms-Bharti Cellular Ltd, Hutchison Max Telecom Pvt.

“The conclusion of aforesaid analysis of the events, evidence, documents and other material on record is that the charge sheet is a distorted and fabricated document, based on deliberately redacted and garbled facts”, the court said. He suggested that the chargesheet was filed for “extraneous reasons”. There is no doubt that the charge sheet was filed at the behest of Shri Kapil Sibal, the Telecom Minister in the UPA Government.

Noting that the telecom sector at the time was “riddled with scams”, the Finance Minister said Sibal had selected a retired Judge of his choice and asked him to unearth an “NDA scam” in telecom.

“I find that there is no incriminating evidence against the accused and the accused deserve to be discharged”, the court ordered.

The court observed that policy matter related to additional spectrum allocation was discussed in detail in the department by the relevant authorities, and there is no obligation on a superior to always honour the views of subordinates.

It remains to be seen whether the CBI will act against its own officers. The CBI also questioned Arun Shourie, who was Telecom Minister in the Vajpayee Government.

Dismissing the charges against the accused, Judge Saini asked incumbent CBI Director Anil Sinha to conduct an inquiry into the agency’s “erring” officials and initiate legal action against them. “This resulted into not only in taking cognisance of the case but also into summoning of additional accused as well”, the judge said.

“Moreover, Shyamal Ghosh was not in favour of allocating additional spectrum to the existing operators at least from March 9, 2001 when the letter was sent to COAI declining additional spectrum and thereafter, at every step, he was resisting it…”, the court said while discharging Ghosh and the three telecom firms in the case.