While throwing out the CBI case, the Special Court made adverse remarks about the functioning of certain officials of the Department of Telecom (DoT) and their maintenance of files concerning the allocation of 2G spectrum.
“...examination of the action or inaction of officials belonging to various departments, that is, DoT, Law Ministry, Finance Ministry and PMO, shows that the controversy about the issue of Letters of Intent on 10.01.2008 and subsequent grant of licences and allocation of spectrum arose due to unnecessary questions and objections raised by some of the officials and unwarranted suggestions put forward by others. None of these suggestions were carried to [their] logical conclusion and were left unaddressed in between. These were used by others to create unnecessary controversy,” Special Judge O.P. Saini said.
“It may be noted that the policy decisions of DoT are scattered in different official files and, as such, are difficult to trace and understand. ...policy issues are strewn around here and there in a disorderly manner. Because of this, it becomes very difficult for outside agencies and institutions to understand issues in proper perspective, leaving scope for controversy,” the judge said.
“Furthermore, files are also opened and closed too quickly in a haphazard manner even for a small issue and there is no systematic way of dealing with issues in one file in a sequential manner at one place...,” the judge stated.
“When documents are not traceable easily and readily and policy issues are scattered haphazardly in so many files, it becomes difficult for anyone to understand the issues. Non-understanding of issues in proper perspective led to a suspicion of grave wrongdoing, where there was none, at least as per record of the court. This factor greatly contributed to the controversy in the instant case as the DoT could neither effectively communicate the issues to others nor others could understand the same,” the judge said.
