Witness Swamy wants PC to be made 2G accused

Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy on Saturday urged a Delhi court to make P Chidambaram an accused in the 2G case for his alleged role in allowing two telecom firms to earn windfall profits by offloading their shares to foreign firms.

Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy on Saturday urged a Delhi court to make P Chidambaram an accused in the 2G case for his alleged role in allowing two telecom firms to earn windfall profits by offloading their shares to foreign firms.

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Deposing as a witness in support of his private complaint, he told Special CBI Judge OP Saini that the then finance minister was also culpable like A Raja, then telecom minister, as they were party to the decision of non-revision of entry fees of Rs 1,658 crore, decided in 2001 during NDA regime.

Chidambaram, as finance minister, had allowed accused Swan Telecom and Unitech Wireless to earn windfall profits by offloading their shares to UAE-based Etisalat and Norway-based Telenor respectively after getting the Unified Access Services Licenses (UASL).

"As far as charge against A Raja is concerned it is that Swan and Unitech were allowed to offload their shares to Etisalat and Telenor respectively," Swamy testified.

The Janata Party leader also referred to a document of November 5, 2008 on a meeting between Raja and Chidambaram, that the finance minister had clarified that the dilution of shares by the two firms did not amount to sale of UASL and was permissible under corporate law.

"Ministry of home affairs had then raised objections regarding Etisalat (the company to which Swan Telecom allegedly off loaded its shares) in India," he said. "Mr P Chidambaram was aware at least on January 9, 2008 of what Mr Raja was planning to do on January 10, 2008 (the day four counters were made in DoT to grant Letters of Intent by allegedly flouting first-come-serve policy)," he said.

Swamy also said: "Raja could not be guilty of this charge (deciding to stick with the price of spectrum fixed in 2001) alone but he committed this offence with the active connivance of P Chidambaram, presently the home minister".