Arguing on the charges against him in the 2G spectrum allocation scam, the former Union Telecom Minister, A. Raja, on Monday came down hard on the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for not chargesheeting other telecom companies, including Tata Teleservices, which were also awarded 2G spectrum and went on to divest stakes through the FDI route as was done by Unitech Wireless and Swan Telecom.
“Not black money”
Mr. Raja's counsel and senior advocate Sushil Kumar told a special CBI court: “Everyone [telecom companies] has got foreign equity induction. Tata Teleservices has got Rs.14,000 crore in this … Induction of equity by permissible route is not black money. The CBI calls it illegal money as I did not auction the licences.”
“Prosecution case is that each one of these companies has sold their licence and on this, the presumptive loss is about Rs.22,000 crore. Out of these nine companies, only two are before this court as accused. Why are the other seven companies not there?”
PM's stand
On the issue of cheating the government exchequer through non-revision of entry fees, Mr. Kumar said: “The stand of the Prime Minister in Parliament is that there is no loss [to the exchequer] in this case. I have the statements of the Prime Minister and Minister of Information Technology in Parliament saying there is no loss.”
He asked the CBI to explain its failure to get a report from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India on the actual loss suffered as a result of the scam.
Cabinet decision
Mr. Raja claimed that the Cabinet had decided in 2003 not to auction spectrum and the same decision was followed right up to his tenure as Telecom Minister.
He also challenged the CBI to point out at least one document or a prosecution witness statement which said he was “obliged” to auction 2G licences.
