Sunday, October 23, 2011

Raja, Kanimozhi & others accused charged in 2G Spectrum

 Delhi Court on Saturday  charged against former Telecom Minister A Raja, DMK MP Kanimozhi and 15 others including top corporate honchos in the multi-crore 2G spectrum scam on various counts like criminal conspiracy, breach of trust, cheating and forgery.

Seventeen  accused have been charged under Section 409 of IPC for alleged criminal breach of trust which attracts a maximum punishment of life term. The other charges attract various terms in jail.

Special CBI judge O P Saini fixed November 11 for commencement of the trial after all the accused refused top lead guilty to various offences. The framing of charges may now pave the way for the accused, who have been behind the bars for several months, to seek bail as the Supreme Court had virtually embargoed all the courts not to entertain their plea before framing of charges.

Besides Raja and Kanimozhi, the Judge framed charges against corporate executives of Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group's President Surendra Pipara, Senior Vice President Hari Nair and Managing Director Gautam Doshi, besides Swan Telecom's promoter Shahid Usman Balwa, his cousin Asif Balwa, their colleague Rajeev Agarwal and Unitech Ltd's MD, Sanjay Chandra and DB Realty's MD, Vinod Goenka.

The Judge said, there was prima facie evidence for framing charges also against Kalaignar TV's MD, Sharad Kumar, Bollywood film producer Karim Morani and three telecom firms Reliance Telecom Ltd, Swan Telecom and Unitech (Tamil Nadu) Wireless Ltd.

Shahid Usman Balwa and other five co-accused, Vinod Goenka, Rajiv Agarwal, Asif Balwa, Karim Morani and Sharad Kumar have also been charged with the offence of hatching criminal conspiracy to file false evidence in judicial proceedings for showing the bribe trail of 200 crore rupees as a loan transaction.

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