Crucial 2G hearing in SC on Monday

Oct 10, 2011 - S.S. Negi |

New Delhi

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The Supreme Court on Monday is all set to examine CBI's 500-odd page file - used by the agency - to give a clean chit to home minister P. Chidambaram for his role as finance minister in fixing the spectrum price.

In the process, the court will also verify the authenticity of former finance secretary D. Subbarao’s statement recorded by the CBI, and relied upon heavily by it and the government to spare Chidambaram the blame in spectrum allocation.

CBI counsel K.K. Venugopal in his unfinished arguments had told the apex court that the statement of Subbarao was a complete 'evidence' on the sequence of events that led to the sale of 2G spectrum by former telecom minister A. Raja in alleged violation of the policy.

A bench of justices G.S. Singhvi and A.K. Ganguly has sought to examine the entire papers to cross check the facts then.

Subbarao's statements were recorded by the agency as a witness under section 161 of CrPC. He is now the governor of Reserve Bank of India.

The 500-page documents mainly contain voluminous correspondence amo-ng the Prime Minister’s Office, cabinet secretariat, finance ministry, communications ministry and department of telecom and TRAI since 2005, seized by the CBI after registration of the case.

When the hearing was adjourned on September 29, the bench had pointed towards certain specific letters and notes emanating from the finance ministry during 2008 to the CBI counsel to seek his clarification on Subbarao’s statement.

Venugopal could not finish his reply and stated that he would need at least 45 minutes more to close his arguments.

So far, the CBI counsel had virtually 'toiled' hard to justify the agency’s stand that no case is made out for questioning of Chidambaram amidst pointed queries from the court related to certain documents.

It includes the March 25, 2011 'controversial note' sent to the PMO by the finance ministry under Pranab Mukh-erjee, putting a question mark on Chidambaram’s role and the 'minutes' of January 30, 2008 meeting between Chidambaram and the then telecom minister A. Raja.

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