By IANS,
New Delhi : The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) Monday sought the nod of the trial court dealing with the second generation (2G) spectrum case to frame fresh charges against the 17 accused, including former telecom minister A. Raja.
The probe agency asked Special Judge O.P. Saini for permission to frame charges for criminal breach of trust by a public servant against Raja, his former aide R.K. Chandolia, and the former telecom secretary Siddartha Behura.
This is a non-bailable offence with punishment that stretches from 10 years to life.
Special Public Prosecutor U.U. Lalit said that a case of framing of charges for criminal breach of trust under section 409 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was certainly made out against Raja, Chandolia and Behura.
“It is submitted that accused one, two and three (Raja, Behura and Chandolia) were public servants having a dominion over valuable 2G spectrum in their respective capacities as public servants,” the application said.
The agency also pressed for charges of criminal breach read with criminal conspiracy against the remaining 14 co-accused in the 2G scam, including Raja’s party colleague and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam MP Kanimozhi.
The other 14 co-accused include three companies.
“Besides Raja and two former officials, all others, including Kanimozhi and three telecom firms should be charged under section 409 (criminal breach) read with 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC,” the application states.
The other accused include Swan Telecom’s Shahid Usman Balwa and Vinod Goenka, Unitech Wireless’ Sanjay Chandra and Reliance Group’s Gautam Doshi, Surendra Pipara and Hari Nayar, besides three companies – Unitech Wireless, Swan Telecom and Reliance Telecom.
These people apart, agency has also named as co-accused Kalaignar TV’s Sharad Kumar, Cineyug Film`s Karim Morani, and the directors of Kusegaon, Asif Balwa and Rajeev B. Agarwal.
Counsel for the accused opposed the plea, saying that the probe agency was using delaying tactics for the trial. Till now, charges against the accused could have subjected them to a maximum imprisonment of seven years.
In a related development, hearing of Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy’s application to make Home Minister P. Chidambaram a co-accused in the case was deferred till Oct 12, with the court hoping that the Supreme Court will decide on the issue by then.