In a development that will facilitate further probe into the multi-crore Satyam scam, the CBI has received response from UK and Singapore authorities to the Letter of Rogatory (LOR), a senior officer said.
LORs - a formal request from a court here to a foreign court for judicial assistance - were sent to six countries: USA, UK, Belgium, British Virgin Islands, Mauritius and Singapore, seeking information in connection with Satyam case.
The CBI has alleged in its chargesheet that B Ramalinga Raju, former chairman of the company and the prime accused, diverted funds to foreign countries.
“Singapore and UK gave interim LORs and asked us for some clarifications and we replied to them. The communication channel is open. We are confident that we may get replies from other countries too,” the CBI official said on the condition of anonymity.
The new management of Satyam Computers, under Tech Mahindra, had found that Mr. Raju and his aides fudged the accounts not only to show non-existent revenues and profits, but also to make money by getting some projects awarded to the company outside its accounting system and pocket the revenue.
Satyam’s management had said in a document released to explain the financial restatement last year that since only Ramalinga Raju and his brother Rama Raju (who was then managing director) had signatory powers on most bank accounts, it was possible that there were undisclosed bank accounts in foreign countries in which funds could have been diverted.
The CBI is confident of finishing prosecution’s part of the trial in the Satyam case by April, the official said.
The agency expects that trial would be over by July 31 as directed by the Supreme Court. The number of total witnesses - 690 as per the chargesheet - will be whittled down to less than 300, the official said.
The special court here which is trying the case is currently recording statements of witnesses produced by the CBI.
“We are reducing the list of witnesses. Only important witnesses are being produced in the court. So far 110 witnesses are completed. And 170 to 180 witnesses were dropped,” the official said.
While cancelling the bail granted to B Ramalinga Raju, the Supreme Court last year directed the trial court to conclude its proceedings by July 2011.
The Apex court also pulled up the CBI for filing bulky chargesheet, and for adding too many witnesses.
Now, even the number of documents has been reduced from the original 3067 to just over 1000.
