Delhi court orders framing of charges against Karti

A Delhi court on Tuesday ordered the framing of charges against Congress MP Karti P Chidambaram and six others in connection with the Chinese visa scam case. Special Judge (CBI) Dig Vinay Singh, who was hearing the case against Karti and seven others, ordered the framing of charges against seven accused and discharged one named Chetan Shrivastava in the case.             

Earlier in October 2024, the CBI had filed a charge sheet against Karti and others in connection with charges of bribery in facilitating visas of Chinese nationals for a power company in 2011, when his father, P Chidambaram, was the Union Home Minister.

In its charge sheet submitted before a special court, the CBI had named Karti Chidambaram, the Lok Sabha MP from Sivaganga, his family’s Chartered Accountant S Bhaskararaman, Talawandi Sabo Power Ltd (TSPL), a subsidiary of Vedanta, and Mumbai-based Bell Tools, through which bribes were allegedly routed.  P Chidambaram was Director of Vedanta International in London, till he became Finance Minister in May 2004.

The agency has invoked charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating, and forgery under the Indian Penal Code and provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Other charge-sheeted accused include Viral Mehta, Anup Agarwal, Mansoor Siddiqui and Chetan Shrivastava, said CBI. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has also registered a case for money laundering.

The CBI had filed the charge sheet after two years of probe into its FIR registered in 2022, where it had alleged that the Punjab-based TSPL was setting up a 1980 MW thermal power plant and the work was outsourced to the Chinese company Shandong Electric Power Construction Corp (SEPCO). The project was running behind its schedule, and the company was allegedly facing the prospect of a penalty.  The CBI FIR, which contained findings of the investigating officer who undertook the preliminary inquiry, alleged that an executive of TSPL approached Karti Chidambaram through his “close associate/front man” Bhaskararaman. “They devised a back-door way to defeat the purpose of the ceiling (maximum of project visas permissible to the company’s plant) by granting permission to re-use 263 project visas allotted to the said Chinese company’s officials,” the agency had said after the registration of FIR and searches. Project visas were a special type of visa introduced in 2010 for the power and steel sector, for which detailed guidelines were issued during P Chidambaram’s tenure as home minister, but there was no provision for the re-issue of project visas, the FIR had alleged.

A TSPL executive allegedly submitted a letter to the Home Ministry on July 30, 2011, seeking approval to reuse the project visas allotted to his company, which was approved within a month and the permission was issued, the FIR had alleged.

“On August 17, 2011, the executive, on being directed by Bhaskararaman, sent a copy of the above letter dated July 30, 2011, to him through e-mail, which was forwarded to Karti... Bhakaskararaman, after discussion with P Chidambaram, the then home minister, demanded an illegal gratification of Rs 50 lakh for ensuring the approval,” said the FIR.

As per the chargesheet, the payment of the said bribe was routed from TSP to Karti Chidambaram and Bhaskararaman through Mumbai-based Bell Tools Ltd, with payments camouflaged under two invoices raised for consultancy and out-of-pocket expenses for Chinese visa-related work. The Chargesheet said that the TSPL executive had later thanked Karti Chidambaram and Bhaskararaman on email.

Payment against the invoices was made by TSPL to Bell Tools Limited through cheque, and then the said amount was paid in cash to Bhaskararaman, said the CBI.