2G spectrum News

Special Judge O P Saini reserved the order for later in the day after hearing a battery of senior advocates appearing for Karti, son of former union minister P Chidambaram.

Mehta will oversee the appeal against the CBI special court verdict by February 19.

The CBI was once termed as a "caged parrot" by the Supreme Court.

A day after his acquittal in the 2G spectrum scam case, former telecom minister A Raja wrote an emotional letter to Karunanidhi and placed the verdict in "his feet with gratitude".   

The court said it might decide the date of judgement on the next date fixed for hearing.

The Superme Court on Friday stayed transfer of 2G licence from Malaysia's Maxis which was originally alloted to Aircel to any other telecom company.

Former Telecom Minister A Raja on Wednesday told a special court that he had informed then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh about the Law Ministry's opinion to refer the matter of processing of applications seeking 2G spectrum to an empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM).

Former Telecom Minister A Raja had "misled" then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh regarding policy of first-come-first-served (FCFS) which was to be followed for allocation of 2G spectrum, CBI on Monday told a special court.

The CBI Wednesday claimed in a special court that Unitech Group firms had knowingly and fraudulently misrepresented facts in their applications before the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for bagging 2G spectrum licences.

The development is likely to benefit almost all incumbent telecom operators like Reliance Communications, Aircel, Tata Teleservices, Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular.

The government has allowed sharing of all spectrum available at present, and similar norms will apply to radiowave frequencies in new bands which will be allocated in future.

CBI Friday told a special court that being the then Telecom minister, A Raja had "actual dominion" over policy matters pertaining to allocation of 2G spectrum and he had accepted it during his defence in the case.

Advancing the ongoing final arguments in the case, Special public prosecutor Anand Grover said that violation of clause 8 of UASL guidelines by the accused firms was a crucial factor.

Enforcement Directorate (ED) Monday told a special court that former Telecom Minister A Raja had "illegally" granted 2G spectrum licences to ineligible firms for which Rs 200 crore was allegedly transferred to Kalaignar TV, owned by DMK supremo M Karunanidhi's family.

A special court on Wednesday dismissed the pleas of Swan Telecom promoter Vinod Goenka, facing trial in 2G spectrum and money laundering cases, to go abroad observing that such appeals put "unnecessary strain" on court's time and resources.

India`s top three mobile phone network operators have spent a combined $13.6 billion in a government auction of airwaves to secure almost 80 percent of the spectrum on offer, reinforcing their positions in the world`s second-biggest mobile market.

Government's proceeds from the spectrum auction Thursday crossed Rs 1 lakh crore mark as aggressive bidding took place across all bands on the eighth day of the biggest sale of 2G and 3G airwaves.

Bids for spectrum grew to around Rs 96,000 crore at the end of seventh day of auction Wednesday, after surprisingly dipping to Rs 92,200 crore yesterday for the biggest-ever sale of 2G and 3G airwaves.

The government has garnered Rs 94,000 crore worth of bids from telecom players at the end of five days of spectrum auction Monday.