80,000-page charge sheet against Raja
By siliconindia   |   Wednesday, 30 March 2011, 18:50 IST   |    30 Comments
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80,000-page charge sheet against Raja
New Delhi: To end the long saga of the 2G scam, the CBI and the government legal advocates have decided to file the charge sheet on April 2nd. An 80,000 page charge sheet will be filed against former Communications Minister A. Raja, four former telecom officials and two telecom companies to the Supreme Court on April 2nd. The documents carry the complete details of the parties involved, politicians who were involved, the Bureaucrats who were involved, the corporates companies who were involved, corporate personalities, Media persons and lobbyists and the Petitioners who brought the scam to the lime light. The 60-day deadline for filing the charge sheet expires on April 3. Earlier the charge sheet was to be submitted on March 31st but the government legal advisor K.K. Venugopal told a Bench of Justices G.S. Singhvi and A.K. Ganguly that the agency was still in the process of readying the charge-sheet. When asked for the reason of the postpone, he said that the persons involved in the case were high profile personalities who vouch for a good defense by raising technical objections at every stage. He said the only way to avoid road blocks from the defense is to have a strong case built on them which has no loop holes. Venugopal also played safe when Justice Singhvi expressed a desire to peruse the draft charge sheet before it was filed in the special court. He said that if they filed the draft charge sheet to the court then the accused would then claim that the Supreme Court has examined the charge sheet and we do not have the option of seeking discharge. The accused will be charged under Sections 420 (cheating), 467 and 471 (forgery and passing off forged documents as original) of the Indian Penal Code, and several charges under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and the Prevention of Corruption Act. The legal advisor has also listed them under conspiracy to defraud, using the first come first serve policy and forgery of official documents. The charge sheet also lists the Swan telecom company and said that the Swan telecom takeover was against the Reserve Bank of India norms. The penalty under the Foreign Exchange Management Act would be five times the loss caused to the government and the company property can also be confiscated. However, the probe into the scam has still not seen a complete end with CBI arresting fresh people to add on to their pages. Two more persons Asif Balwa and Rajeev B Agarwal or alleged involvement in money transfer to DMK's Kalaingar TV channel in connection with the 2-G spectrum case. Asif is the younger brother of former Managing Director of DB-Etislat group Shahid Balwa, who has already been arrested by the CBI. Shahid's association with the underworld is being probed by the agency separately. Further on the current scenario Justice Singhvi has made it very clear that no interference from any quarter would be tolerated. If there was any interference, the CBI could bring it to the court's notice immediately.

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