2G scam: Another CBI chargesheet likely on Monday

By IANS,

New Delhi: The CBI is likely to file a supplementary chargesheet Monday against the family members of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi and the owners of three Mumbai-based firms, including real estate major DB Realty, in the scandal involving 2G spectrum allocation to mobile phone companies, sources in the probe agency said.


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The supplementary chargesheet, which will be the second in the case, will be filed in a Delhi court, said a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officer, who declined to be named, Sunday.

The CBI filed the first chargesheet in the case April 2, naming DMK chief Karunanidhi’s party colleague and former telecommunications minister A. Raja and eight others, including three officials of the Reliance ADA Group in it.

“The CBI in its supplementary chargesheet will focus on a transaction between companies linked to promoters of DB Realty and Kalaignar TV, a broadcaster owned by the family of the Tamil Nadu chief minister,” said the CBI source.

In the chargesheet, as many as nine people may be accused of perpetrating various crimes under the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act, the source said.

“They include DMK Rajya Sabha member Kanimozhi, her step-mother Dayalu Ammal and Sharad Kumar, all of whom are stakeholders in the broadcaster,” said the source.

Others likely to be named by the CBI as accused were promoters of Mumbai-based DB Realty, Shahid Usman Balwa and Vinod Goenka, Karim Morani of Cineyug Films and Asif Balwa and Rajiv B. Agarwal of Kusegaon Realty, besides Raja, said the source.

The charge sheet is expected to revolve around a transaction in which over Rs.200 crore was transferred from the DB Group to Kalaignar TV.

The money transfer allegedly confirmed a deal between Raja and members of the Karunanidhi family and promoters of DB Realty, who had floated their telecom arm Swan now known as Etisalat-DB.

Raja, Kanimozhi and DB Realty have denied any wrongdoing.

The transaction that forms the core of the second CBI chargesheet entailed transferring of Rs.214 crore during 2009-10 from a subsidiary of DB Realty to Kalaignar TV by way of two other companies. As part of the deal, Cineyug was to pick up over 30 percent stake in the TV channel.

The investigating agency arrested Asif Balwa, younger brother of Swan Telecom’s Shahid Usman Balwa, and owner of Kusegaon Realty, along with co-owner Rajiv Agarwal March 29. Both are likely to be named in the second chargesheet.

Raja, his personal aide R.K. Chandolia, former telecom secretary Siddhartha Behura and Swan Telecom promoter Shahid Balwa are already in judicial custody.

Raja resigned as minister Nov 14 last year. While the former minister was subsequently arrested by the probe agency in the national capital Feb 2, along with Behura and Chandolia, Swan Telecom promoter Balwa was arrested from Pune Feb 8.

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