Chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) on the 2G spectrum allocation issue, P.C. Chacko on Tuesday said all former telecom ministers since 1998, including A. Raja and Dayanidhi Maran, who are facing allegations in connection with the issue, will depose before the panel.
Meanwhile, the JPC has shortlised 85 names who will be asked to depose before it, which also includes former telecom minister, former Trai chairman, former solicitor-general Soli Sorabjee, former finance secretaries, since 1998. Mr Chacko said the panel will also look into as at what level the migration package of telecom licence was cleared during the BJP-led NDA rule.
Mr Chacko, while briefing the media, said CBI director A.P. Singh, who briefed the panel on Tuesday, said that the investigating agency in its chargesheet in the 2G spectrum allocation case has pegged the loss to the exchequer at `30,984 crores. Sources said Mr Singh and two other CBI officials were asked by DMK member T.R. Baalu not to name any telecom minister, apparently to pre-empt him from naming Mr Maran. However, Mr Chacko insisted that Mr Maran’s name did not figure during the discussions held on Tuesday.
He, however, said the CBI director told the JPC that the agency was also probing the alleged delay of two years in granting telecom licences to Aircel-Maxis between 2004 and 2006. Mr Maran, who is the current Union textiles minister, was at the helm of affairs in the telecom ministry then.
Fourteen licences were issued to Aircel Maxis in 2004 but the licences were given in 2006.
“The CBI is probing why there was a delay,” Mr Chacko said. The CBI director also told the JPC that a third chargesheet into the 2G scam will be filed during the current month.
Mr Singh and his team briefed the JPC about the “progress and findings” into the alleged irregularities into the 2G spectrum allocation in January 2008.