The UPA’s bid to smear the Vajpayee Government with the taint of the 2G scam was exposed on Thursday when a Special Court discharged the then Telecom Secretary, Shymal Ghosh, who had been hounded for the past four years by the CBI. The court termed the CBI’s chargesheet on the allotment of additional spectrum in 2002 as “false and fabricated.” Hailing the verdict, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley sought an apology from the Congress.
While acquitting Ghosh, Airtel and Vodafone’s erstwhile firms Hutchison and Sterling Cellular of all charges, Special Judge OP Saini ordered the CBI Director to conduct an enquiry against RA Yadav, the Investigating Officer of the agency, for creating a chargesheet “full of distorted facts.”
“I am reading out the last paragraph of the order. It’s a false and fabricated chargesheet and there is no incriminating evidence against any of the accused so they are discharged. The chargesheet is full of distorted facts and an attempt has been made to mislead the court,” the judge said.
The “CBI Director is directed to make an enquiry against erring officials,” the Judge added, while presenting 235-page order detailing the faults in the CBI’s chargesheet filed in 2001 “for extraneous reasons.”
“The conclusion of aforesaid analysis of the events, evidences, documents and other material on record is that the chargesheet is a distorted and fabricated document, based on deliberately redacted and garbled facts. It has been so drafted as to create an impression of a grave crime, where there is none.
“An attempt has been made to create an impression in the chargesheet that everything was done on a single day in the dark hours of evening of March 31, 2002. There is no doubt that the chargesheet has been filed for extraneous reasons. In the end, I find that there is no incriminating material on record against the accused and the accused deserve to be discharged,” said Special Judge OP Saini in the detailed order.
Upbeat with the verdict, the BJP demanded an apology from the Congress and targeted former Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal at “whose behest”, the party claimed, the CBI filed a chargesheet in a case of additional spectrum of 2002.
“Indeed the officers are guilty of fabricating charges against an honest civil servant and others. There is no doubt that the chargesheet was filed at the behest of Shri Kapil Sibal, the Telecom Minister in the UPA Government,” said Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley hitting out at the former Congress Minister.
“At the time when the Telecom sector was riddled with scams, Kapil Sibal selected a retired Judge of his choice and asked him to unearth an ‘NDA Scam’ in Telecom,” he wrote a post on Facebook.
The Finance Minister was reacting to CBI Special Judge OP Saini discharging all the accused including former Telecom Secretary Shymal Ghosh in a case related to fixation of spectrum user charges in 2002 during the NDA regime. The then Telecom Minister, late Pramod Mahajan, was named as a deceased accused.
Jaitley said he had consistently maintained that this chargesheet was full of fabricated facts. “The court has vindicated what we had always maintained. The CBI officers who acted on the dictates of the Government will now face an enquiry…But what about the Ministers who conspired to create a fabricated chargesheet and a retired Judge who, for the sake of a post-retirement assignment, agreed to lend his offices for the sameIJ” he asked.
In 2011, stung by the 2G scam, the UPA managers went all out to drag NDA-I regime in the scandal. The CBI also questioned Arun Shourie, who was Telecom Minister in the Vajpayee Government. In November 2011, the CBI registered an FIR accusing irregularities during the late Pramod Mahajan’s period and a chargesheet was filed in December 2012.
Accusing Mahajan of allotting additional spectrum to Airtel and Vodafone’s erstwhile companies Hutchison and Sterling Cellular, the CBI charghsheeted then Telecom Secretary Ghosh and these three companies. The very first day of argument Judge Saini questioned CBI’s motive to chargesheet only one person. “Where are the other human facesIJ How can you chargesheet only one person in a conspiracy chargesIJ Tell me with whom he conspiredIJ Find the human faces behind these companiesIJ” said Saini.
later, on the 2G court’s directions, the CBI chargesheeted Airtel chief Sunil Mittal, Vodafone stakeholders Ravi Ruia and Asim Ghosh. But the Supreme Court Bench headed by then Chief Justice Altamas Kabir had stayed the order on chargesheeting the three corporate honchos. In January 2015, the SC Bench headed by Chief Justice Hl Dattu ratified this decision and quashed the chargehseet against these three corporate heads.
After a three-year long embargo in the case due to pending litigation in the Supreme Court, the 2G court fixed October 15 for order on framing of charges. Ghosh, the lone official left in the chargesheet, is a 1965-batch retired IAS officer, who was the Telecom Secretary between February 7, 2000 and May 31, 2002.
Addressing a press conference at BJP headquarters, another Union Minister Prakash Javadekar said a host of judicial orders, including two from the Supreme Court, had “exposed” the conspiracies being “hatched” by the opposition party to defame Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the previous NDA government.
When A Raja, Telecom Minister in the UPA Government, had resigned over the 2G spectrum allocation scam, Sibal had claimed that the Government’s policy was continuation of previous Vajpayee dispensation’s decision, he said.
Javadekar also cited the indictment of dismissed IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt, who had tried to link then Gujarat Chief Minister Modi with 2002 post-Godhra riots, by the apex court to accuse Congress of being the “handler and conspirator” and using Bhatt as a “pawn”.
“The lies of Congress have been exposed. Its conspiracy has fallen apart. We seek an apology from Congress. After these orders, it is not saying anything. It is resorting to spit, run and hide tactic,” Javadekar said noting that it ran a campaign against Modi for 13 years on the basis of Bhatt’s allegation.
He also referred to a Supreme Court decision to dismiss a bunch of pleas seeking a probe into the alleged scam in purchase of defence equipments in 1999 Kargil operations to hit out at the opposition party. The Congress, he recalled, had boycotted the then Defence Minister George Fernandes alleging “coffin scam”.
Justice delivered