A city court on Friday dismissed CBI’s plea seeking to place on record a CD of former corporate lobbyist Niira Radia’s taped conversations and the transcripts of her calls purportedly pertaining to spectrum allocation.
Special CBI Judge OP Saini dismissed the plea saying that it seems that the agency is not “much serious” about its petition as it has not provided certain documents to the accused.
It said, “The (plea for) filing of the CD on record has been vehemently opposed by the defence on various grounds — including that the same would prejudice the defence as the same is being attempted to be placed on record belatedly, when the accused have already disclosed their defence. It is further submitted that this CD cannot be taken on record through an incomplete application as annexure ‘A’ of the aforesaid letter has not been supplied to them,” the judge said.
The court noted that the CBI had not supplied to the accused the annexure ‘A’ to the letter dated May 20, 2010 which was received by it from the Income Tax department having the details of intercepted calls stored in a USB hard disk. During the brief arguments on Friday, Special Public Prosecutor UU lalit told the court that he is unable to supply the documents as it contains other details which are not relevant to this case and “cannot be disclosed in the interest of security of the state.” The court dismissed the plea and asked the agency to proceed with the ongoing trial. “The plea is dismissed,” the judge said, adding, “How many applications will you (CBI) moveIJ let the case proceed.” The court, however, allowed CBI’s separate plea for recalling prosecution witness Nitin Jain, whose statement has already been recorded.