SINCERETY , HONESTY AND INTEGRITY WON ONCE AGAIN

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), probing into alleged irregularities of spectrum allocation during NDA’s regime, has given a clean chit to former telecom minister Arun Shourie. Shourie, who was the telecom minister between 2003 and 2004 when the NDA was in power, was examined by CBI last year but the agency did not find any ‘criminality’ committed during his tenure, said officials. The agency is also learnt to have intimated the Supreme Court about the status of preliminary enquiry (PE) registered against Shourie on the orders of the apex court. The agency said there was no prima facie evidence against him. The agency was asked by the apex court to investigate the grant of licences to telecom firms between 2001 to 2007, which included Shourie’s tenure. Earlier, Shourie has clarified on the “first-come first-serve” policy which was formulated during his tenure. The CBI’s status report based on the examination of Shourie says that “in fact Shourie tried to auction spectrum despite the FCFS policy to explore revenue generation, but there were not many takers for spectrum at that time. So he allotted licences on FCFS basis in Northeast, Assam and Jammu and Kashmir where there were no takers”. The agency during its year-long probe also examined DoT files and witnesses and came across few instances of procedural lapses. There was no ‘malafide’ intention to commit any irregularities. ****************************************************************************************** KPKUMAR@LAWSERVICES