The Supreme Court on Monday reserved its judgement on a plea by Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy for a probe into Home Minister P. Chidambaram’s role as the then finance minister in deciding the second generation (2G) spectrum pricing.
Swamy said, “Counsels representing Union of India pleaded before the court that Chidambaram was being targeted, which could lead to destabilization of the government.” Swamy alleged that CBI was protecting Chidambaram.
Swamy, a petitioner in the 2G spectrum allocation case, had recently submitted to the Supreme Court a Finance Ministry note which said the Telecom Ministry could have gone in for auction of 2G spectrum licenses had Chidambaram, the then Finance Minister, insisted on it
CBI counsel Venugopal told the apex court bench of Justice G.S. Singhvi and Justice A.K. Ganguly that once the CBI had completed the probe and the special trial court was holding hearing on the framing of charges, the apex court could not direct the investigating agency to undertake a fresh probe in the matter.
The court said that so long as the charges had not been framed and trial had not commenced, the investigating agency could be asked to carry out further probe in the light of new material.
Swamy said that it was important that the CBI probe Chidambaram as it was discovered that Swann and Unitech companies benefitted from the allocation.
Meanwhile, former telecom minister A Raja in his application sought the special court’s permission to appear before the apex court as he wanted to clarify the issue that Chidambaram signed all documents related to spectrum allocation. So, he asked the special court to call Chidambaram as a witness in the case.
“Chidambaram was party to all decisions. I’m not calling him as an accused. He was acquainted with all facts and circumstances of the case. My job will be done by calling Chidambaram as a court witness. Let the court decide if it wants to call the prime minister,” Raja earlier told the court.
Raja has repeatedly argued in court that the decisions he took were sanctioned by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram.
Criminal breach of public trust is a non-bailable offence with punishment that stretches from 10 years to life.
Raja, DMK MP Kanimozhi and executives of several telecom companies have been arrested by the CBI in connection with the 2G scam.
