New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Monday issued
notice to CBI seeking its response by March 13 on the plea of
Sanjay Chandra, MD of Unitech Ltd and an accused in 2G case,
for quashing of charges framed against him by the trial court.
"Issue notice to CBI," a bench of Justice M L Mehta said.
Chandra had moved the high court against the October 22,
2011 order of Special CBI Judge on framing of charges in the
2G case, saying it was passed in a "casual and perfunctory
manner".
He had said the order was passed "without application of
judicial mind" as there was no evidence to show that he had
conspired with any public servant for wrongful financial gain.
"There was no evidence to show that the petitioner
(Chandra) had in any manner conspired with any public servant
to cause wrongful gain to himself or wrongful loss to the
government of India," he had submitted.
The petition said there was no evidence that he or his
company had paid any bribe for securing the Unified Access
Services Licences (UASL) and this distinguishes his case from
the remaining accused persons.
"Despite this admission of the respondent (CBI), the
trial court wrongly linked the bribery allegation and the
Unitech Wireless Companies in its order on charge.
"In the light of this categorical admission by the
respondent (CBI), the petitioners case is no different from
that of any of the non-prosecuted persons/companies who were
granted LOIs in January 2008 or licences up to March 2007 and
subsequently issued licences, or which were granted licences
up to March 2007 at the entry fee determined in 2001," Chandra
had said.
He said the order of the trial court is not maintainable
as the whole case of CBI has failed to attribute any
criminality against him.
The trial court had framed charges against Chandra under
various provisions of the IPC and the Prevention of Corruption
Act also dealing with criminal conspiracy, cheating, and
forgery.
It said he cheated DoT by getting the licenses despite
the fact that eight of the group companies were not eligible
for the licenses on the date of application.
The trial court had observed that it prima facie appeared
that Unitech Wireless (Tamil Nadu) Pvt Ltd was ineligible for
2G licences and by offloading shares immediately after getting
licences it bagged huge wrongful profits.
The court, in its order, had discussed windfall profits
earned by Unitech Wireless which did not have telecom as its
business objective in the Memmorandum of Association.
The trial court, by the same order, had also framed
charges against other accused in the case, including former
Telecom Minister A Raja and DMK MP Kanimozhi. The offences
entail punishment ranging from six months in jail to life
imprisonment.
PTI
