The Supreme Court on Friday sought the Union government's response to the Comptroller and Auditor-General (CAG) report that said the 2G spectrum allocation had caused the national exchequer a loss of Rs.1,39,652 crore and a corresponding gain to few private persons and companies.
A Bench of Justices G.S. Singhvi and A.K. Ganguly asked Solicitor-General Gopal Subramaniam to go through the report and come out with his response on October 22, next date of hearing.
Earlier, Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the Centre for Public Interest Litigation, pointed to the report that stated that the Department of Telecommunications had overruled the specific objections of the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister and the Law Minister and awarded the scarce spectrum at very low rates to a favoured few, mostly ineligible companies.
Quoting the report, he said the entire process of fixing a cut-off date, and then changing it after the applications came in created an artificial demand and competition for licences. The report stated that the entire process of spectrum allocation was undertaken arbitrarily. For no apparent reason, Communications Minister A. Raja had ignored the advice of the Law and Finance Ministries and avoided the deliberations of the Telecom Commission to allocate the spectrum, a scarce national asset, at less than its true value, on flexible criteria and procedures, to a few operators.
The Solicitor-General submitted that the CBI would require six months to complete a thorough probe which, he said, would be free and fair. When Mr. Justice Singhvi wanted to know the government's stand on the report, Mr. Subramaniam said he would come out with the response after studying it.
Without perusing the status reports filed in sealed covers by the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate on the investigations, the Bench returned them to the Solicitor-General, saying the report would be considered at the next hearing.
Appearing for Mr. Raja, senior counsel T. R. Andhyarujina said the transcript of the tapes of the telephone conversations among several persons, including Nira Radia, a public relations firm owner, and some journalists, had to be examined thoroughly before a view was taken on it.
Mr. Bhushan submitted that neither Mr. Raja nor Ms. Radia were interrogated or arrested so far, though the tapped conversation pointed to their alleged involvement in the scam.
Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy submitted that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh did not grant sanction for prosecution of Mr. Raja, and that he should be permitted to file a complaint before the magistrate concerned for a directive for investigation.
Mr. Justice Singhvi told him that his appeal would be heard on October 22.
