CBI recovers incriminating documents during searches

The CBI today said it had seized "incriminating" documents during searches at 14 places, including former Telecom Minister A Raja's residence, in connection with its probe into the 2G spectrum scam.

The CBI on Wednesday said it had seized "incriminating" documents during searches at 14 places, including former Telecom Minister A Raja's residence, in connection with its probe into the 2G spectrum scam.

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According to CBI, the searches were conducted at the premises of Raja, his former personal secretary R K Chandolia, the then Secretary of Department of Telecommunication Siddhartha Behuria and the then Member, Telecom Commission, Department of Telecommunication K Sridhar.

The premises of the then Deputy Director General, Access Service Wing, Department of Telecommunication A K Srivastava and Managing Director of Chennai-based export firm (Greenhouse Exports) Sadiqui Batcha were also searched in ongoing investigation relating to irregularities in allotment of Unified Access Service (UAS) Licence, a CBI official said.

"Searches conducted so far at around 14 places have yielded recovery of incriminating documents," Deputy Inspector General and spokesperson of CBI Vineeta Thakur said, adding that "searches are still going on".

The CBI had earlier registered a case on October 21, 2009 against unknown officials of Department of Telecommunication and unknown private persons or companies and others under Section of IPC and Prevention of Corruption Act.

"It has been alleged that there had been serious irregularities in the award of Unified Access Services Licences to private companies.

"As per information received, there was criminal conspiracy between certain officials of DoT and private persons or companies and others in order to award licences to these companies by putting a cap on the number of applicants against recommendations of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India and by awarding licences to private companies on first come first serve basis on the rates of 2001 without any competitive bidding," Thakur said.