The Supreme Court on Wednesday retained senior advocate KK Venugopal as amicus curiae in the monitoring of the 2G case snubbing the Centre which had removed him as counsel for Enforcement Directorate (ED).
The decision to remove Venugopal, who was appointed special counsel by the apex court to jointly represent both CBI and ED in the monitoring of the 2G case, was reportedly made after the Finance Ministry — the nodal Ministry of ED, cited “conflict of interest” as a ground to remove him. The Government claimed that Venugopal submitted a note without consulting the
ED on the shifting of an ED officer Rajeshwar Singh from the 2G probe.
“We have seen it in newspaper. We passed the order (staying transfer of Singh) based on a positive direction by CAT. That is not a big sin,” commented the Bench comprising Chief Justice Hl Dattu and Justice Arun Mishra. The 2G petitioners — advocate Prashant Bhushan and Subramanian Swamy, proposed to appoint the senior lawyer as amicus curiae.
Considering that the case was at fag end, the Bench added, “We know how to tell them. It’s a judicial order. We were fully conscious when we passed the order and if that is the ground against you, we want you to be with us.”
The Bench appointed Venugopal as amicus curiae instructing the ED to provide all assistance to him. He will appear for both CBI and ED. Besides, the bench asked the CBI, ED and Income Tax department to hold monthly coordination meetings.
Swamy brought up his pending application in the Aircel-Maxis probe seeking a direction for CBI to reveal the probe against former Finance Minister P Chidambaram. He alleged direct role of Chidambaram in granting Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) to Malaysian company Maxis which bought Aircel.
Venugopal submitted in sealed cover a set of four CBI status reports which according to sources in the CBI contained the CAG’s P&T Audit wings’ findings detailing the illegalities by FIPB in approving the deal.
The Aircel-Maxis deal was worth over Rs 3,500 crore that required approval of Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA). Chidambaram as FIPB Chairman had power to approve foreign investment up to Rs 600 crore and since he did not send the Maxis file for CCEA approval, the agency had questioned him in December last, sources added
The CAG findings revealed that actual money that came from Malaysian company Maxis was more than Rs 4,700 crore. The extra Rs 1,200 above the approved value is expected to invite FEMA violations against Chidambaram and other senior Finance Ministry officials involved in the Aircel-Maxis deal of 2006. The bench decided to go through the reports and deal with Swamy’s application on September 23.