Kanimozhi, Raja acquitted in 2G scam; CBI, ED to appeal against verdict
New Delhi: The alleged multi-crore 2G telecom scam, which virtually brought down the UPA government, on Thursday fell flat as the CBI special court acquitted all accused, including former telecom minister A. Raja and DMK MP Kanimozhi of corruption and money laundering charges.
Special Judge O.P.Saini in his 1,552-page verdict said, “I have no hesitation in holding that the prosecution has miserably failed to prove any charge against any of the accused, made in its well-choreographed chargesheet. All 17 accused are acquitted.”
The judge said that the CBI could not prove that Mr. Raja, along with officials from companies that got the 2G licenses, had conspired to receive kickbacks from the sale of phone permits, causing a notional loss of '1.76 lakh crore to the government.
Giving a clean chit to former PM Manmohan Singh, the judge said, “on account of the various actions and inactions of the officials, nobody believed the version of department of telecommunications and a huge scam was seen by everyone where there was none. It is clear that complete facts were not placed before the then Prime Minister by his own office for which A. Raja cannot be faulted.”
CBI, ED to appeal against verdict
Indicting the CBI, the judge said, “I religiously sat in open court for the last seven years from 10 am to 5 pm even during summer vacation awaiting for someone with legally admissible evidence. Not a single soul turned up. This indicates that everybody was going by public perception created by rumour, gossip and speculation. However, public perception has no place in judicial proceedings.”
The judge said there is no material on record to show that A. Raja was mother lode of conspiracy in the instant case. There is also no evidence of his no-holds-barred immersion in any wrongdoing, conspiracy or corruption. I may add that many facts recorded in the charge sheet are factually incorrect, like finance secretary strongly recommending revision of entry fee, deletion of a clause of draft LOI by A. Raja, recommendations of Trai for revision of entry fee etc.”
The “2G Scam” had rocked the UPA government over alleged irregularities in the allocation of second generation (2G) spectrum in 2008, when Unified Access Services licences were issued on a first come, first served basis at a price that was decided in 2001. The CBI alleged the exchequer had suffered a loss of Rs 30,984 crore in the allocation of 122 licences without conducting an auction to arrive at the maximum price for 2G spectrum.
Absolving the accused of all charges, Judge Saini said, “No evidence on the record was produced before the court indicating any criminality in the acts allegedly committed by the accused persons relating to the fixation of cut-off date, manipulation of first come first served policy.”
The court further said “Non-understanding of issues led to a suspicion of grave wrongdoing where there was none. DoT could neither effectively communicate the issues to others nor others could understand the same. Issues got snowballed when media reports started appearing. The lack of clarity in the policies as well as guidelines added to the confusion.”
This verdict by judge Saini raises questions about the Supreme Court verdict delivered in 2012, when it cancelled 122 2G licences granted by the UPA government in 2008 on first-come first-serve basis.
The CBI said, “it appears that the evidence adduced to substantiate the charges has not been appreciated by the trial court. In due course the CBI will be filing an appeal in the Delhi HC.” The Enforcement Directorate also said it would file an appeal challenging this verdict.
The Chronology of events in the 2G spectrum allocation case
May 2007: A Raja takes over as telecom minister in the UPA government.
Aug. 2007: DoT begins the process of allotment of 2G spectrum along with UAS Licences.
Sept. 25: Telecom ministry fixes deadline for application as Oct 1, 2007.
Oct. 1: DoT receives 575 applications by 46 firms.
Nov. 2: Then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh writes to Raja to ensure fair licence allocation.
Nov. 22: Finance ministry writes to DoT raising concerns over the procedure.
Jan. 10, 2008: DoT decides to issue licences on first- come-first-serve basis, preponing cutoff date to September 25.
2008: Swan Telecom, Unitech and Tata Teleservices sell off a part of their stakes at much higher rates to Etisalat, Telenor and DoCoMo.
May 4, 2009: Telecom Watchdog files complaint to the CVC on the illegalities in the spectrum allocation to Loop Telecom.
July 1: Delhi HC holds advancing of cut-off date as illegal on a petition of telecom company S-Tel.
2009: CVC directs CBI to investigate into the allegations of illegalities in the allocation of 2G spectrum.
Oct. 21: CBI files FIR against unknown officers of DoT, unknown private persons/companies, etc.
Sept. 13, 2010: SC asks Centre, Raja to reply to pleas alleging a '70,000-crore scam in the grant of telecom licences in 2008.
Nov. 10: CAG submits report on 2G spectrum to government, claims loss of '1.76 lakh crore to state.
Nov. 14: Raja resigns as telecom minister.
Feb. 2, 2011: Raja and other officials arrested by CBI.
April 25: CBI files second chargesheet naming Kanimozhi and others.
Oct. 23: Charges framed against accused.
Feb. 2, 2012: SC cancels 122 licences granted during A. Raja’s tenure. Directs auction in 4 months.
Feb. 4: Special Court dismisses Subramanian Swamy’s plea to make former FM P. Chidambaram a co-accused.
Aug. 24: SC dismisses plea for probe against Chidambaram in the case.
April 25, 2014: ED charge-sheets Raja, Kanimozhi and others in a 2G case related money laundering case.
Oct. 31: Charges framed in money laundering case.
Nov. 10: Final arguments from December 19.
Dec. 5, 2017: Special Court fixes December 21 for pronouncement of judgement.
Dec. 21: Special court acquits all accused including Raja and all others in all the three cases.
