The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to stop the CBI from filing a charge sheet against the former Telecom Minister, Dayanidhi Maran, in the Aircel-Maxis deal case.
A Bench of Justices H.L. Dattu, S.A. Bobde and Abhay Manohar Sapre rejected Mr. Maran’s writ petition as “premature” and said an investigating agency could not be restrained from filing a charge sheet if it decided that the probe had been completed.
(A PTI report said the CBI was likely to file its charge sheet on Friday.)
After the court refused to entertain the petition, senior counsel Aryama Sundaram, appearing for Mr. Maran, said, “We will withdraw the petition with liberty to approach the court later.” The court granted that prayer to approach an “appropriate forum at an appropriate stage.”
Earlier, Mr. Sundaram submitted that the investigation had not been fully completed and hence the charge sheet should not be filed. He said if the charge sheet was filed admittedly on incomplete investigation in Malaysia, though the probe was completed in India, it would cause great stigma and affect Mr. Maran’s reputation in his political career. He said the filing of charge sheet would have wide ramifications which must be borne in mind.
In the last hearing on August 12, senior counsel K.K. Venugopal, appearing for the CBI, had told the court that the charge sheet would be filed by the end of August and it would be based on evidence collected within the country as the Malaysian authorities had refused to cooperate.
Justice Dattu told Mr. Sundaram, “If for any reason a defective charge sheet is filed, it will be to your advantage and you can move this court or an appropriate forum and demonstrate the flaws for quashing the defective charge sheet.”
When the counsel claimed that the Director of Prosecution in the CBI had stated that there was no case for filing a charge sheet, Justice Dattu pointed out that the highest law officer of the country (Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi) had given an opinion that the charge sheet could be filed. The counsel also pointed out that this case was not related to the 2G spectrum allocation case and the apex court should decide in which court the charge sheet could be filed.
According to the FIR registered by the CBI, C. Sivasankaran, who had originally sought spectrum licence, was forced to sell Aircel. In March 2006, the Maxis group, owned by Malaysian business tycoon T. Ananda Krishnan, bought 74 per cent stake in Aircel. The company got the approval of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) in May 2006.
In November 2006, the Department of Telecom issued 14 Letters of Intent to Aircel and all of them were converted into licences in December 2006. Within three months of this, Mr. Maran’s family-owned business, Sun Direct, received substantial investment from the Maxis Group (Aircel) by taking 20 per cent equity in Sun Direct. The FIPB approved this investment on March 2 and 19, 2007. The Maxis Group invested a total of Rs. 599.01 crore in Sun Direct between December 2007 and December 2009.
