In a significant judgment concerning the 2G spectrum allocation scam of 2008, the Supreme Court on Tuesday held that there was no legal infirmity in its two orders restricting the high court from hearing matters arising out of the case. A bench comprising justices G.S. Singhvi and K.S. Radhakrishnan rejected the pleas of the accused in the multi-crore scam seeking recall of its orders dated April 11, 2011 and November 9, 2012 which had directed that all matters arising out of the case will be heard directly by it and not by the high court. The bench also declined another plea of the accused for framing of guidelines in a court-monitored probe.
The bench said there was “no error” in the two orders which were passed in “larger public interest and for speedy trial” on day-to-day basis for doing complete justice in the case of high magnitude involving highly-placed officers of telecom department, the then communications minister, bureaucrats and businessmen.
“Writ petitions lack merits and they are accordingly dismissed, so also the interim applications... We have found no error in the orders passed by this court on April 11, 2011 or on November 9, 2012. Therefore, the question of rectifying any error does not arise... We, therefore, find no good reason either to frame guidelines to be followed by a constitutional court in relation to monitoring of criminal investigation or any legal infirmity in the orders passed by this court,” the bench said.
“This court taking into consideration the width and ambit of investigation which even spreads overseas and the larger public interest involved, passed the orders impugned, reserving the right of all including the accused persons to move this court if their prayer would amount to staying or impeding the progress of the trial,” it said.
The petitions seeking recall of April 11, 2011 and November 9, 2012 orders were filed by several people.
Swan Telecom promoters Shahid Usman Balwa and Vinod Goenka, Kusegaon Fruits and Vegetables Pvt Ltd directors Rajiv Agarwal and Asif Balwa and R.K. Chandolia.