Monday, February 18, 2013
Rajesh Ahuja, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, February 18, 2013
First Published: 01:28 IST(18/2/2013)
Last Updated: 01:37 IST(18/2/2013)

Ex-minister’s kin on board of choppergate IT company

Former union minister of state for coal Santosh Bagrodia’s younger brother Satish Bagrodia is a director in Chandigarh-based IDS Infotech Limited, which Italian investigators allege was a key vehicle to route the AgustaWestland deal bribe money to India in the garb of fake software and engineering contracts.

According to documents accessed by HT, Partap Krishan Agarwal is managing director of IDS Infotech, and Satish Bagrodia, his two sons Ashish and Manish, and Yog Prakash Agarwal and Narinder Agarwal are other directors. Satish and Manish were appointed directors in 1989, while Ashish Bagrodia became a director in the company in 2005.

“I have nothing to do with business ventures of my brother,” said Santosh Bagrodia when contacted by HT. “At the time of joining politics in 1986, on my suggestion, we four brothers separated our respective businesses.”

This is not the first time that business ventures of Santosh Bagrodia’s brothers have landed him in controversy. In the coal block allocation scam, allegations were leveled against Santosh Bagrodia over a Rs. 600-crore mining contract awarded by a unit of state-owned Coal India Limited during his tenure in the coal ministry to Cuprum Bagrodia, a company of another of his brothers, Vinod. Santosh was coal minister between April 2008 and May 2009. 

Satish Bagrodia told HT that IDS Infotech was providing business and software solutions to AgustaWestland till 2009, when it “sold” this business to Aeromatrix, another Chandigarh based firm.

And along with the business went Praveen Bakshi, an employee of IDS Infotech till 2009 as their executive vice president, and now the CEO of Aeromatrix, in which two Italians Guido Ralph Hasckhe and Carlo Gerosa were directors. Hasckhe and Gerosa have been named as middlemen in the AgustaWestland deal by the Italian prosecutors.

Contrary to Satish Bagrodia’s claims, Italian prosecutors believe that IDS Infotech never supplied any services to AgustaWestland, and that the contract between the two firms -- signed on March 1, 2007 -- was merely a mechanism to funnel kickbacks to India. They say bribes worth Rs. 156 crore were paid through IDS Infotech and IDS Tunisia, a company in which the Chandigarh-firm owns substantial shares. Details of invoices tracking the payment made to IDS Infotech also point to money paid till February 27, 2010 – just 19 days after AgustaWestland finally won the Rs. 3760 crore deal to supply 12 VVIP choppers to India. 

“I and Partap are equal partners in IDS Infotech. My status is more of an investor in the company,” said Satish. 

Partap Agarwal didn’t reply to HT’s phone call and text message.

On the allegation that IDS was a vehicle of channelling bribe money, Satish Bagrodia said since Partap Agarwal running the company he is not aware of it. “But I believe IDS Infotech has done nothing wrong,” he said. Satish also claimed that except IDS Infotech, he doesn’t have any other business venture with Partap Agarwal.

But documents available with HT reveal that the business relations between Agarwal and Bagrodia run much deeper. Agarwal is director in nine companies besides being managing director of two other companies-IDS Infotech Limited and IDS Engineering Limited. Satish Bagrodia and his sons Ashish and Manish are also directors in IDS Engineering.

Manish Bagrodia and Partap Agarwal are also jointly directors in at least four more companies -- Delta Infoway, IDS Infosys, IDS Argus Healthcare and IDS SITEL Technologies.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print/1013101.aspx

NEW DELHI, February 18, 2013
More skeletons tumble out of leaked 2G call transcripts

SHALINI SINGH

CBI prosecutor in touch with second accused Balwa; CBI cherry-picks from CAG’s list of ineligible applicants

New evidence suggests that the CBI’s 2G prosecution case could be even more severely compromised. Detailed call transcripts of a conversation, allegedly between the CBI’s prosecutor A.K. Singh and the key accused, Unitech Managing Director, Sanjay Chandra, reveal that the prosecutor was additionally in discussion with a second key accused Shahid Balwa of Swan Telecom.

Private TV channel CNN-IBN, which had exclusive access to some parts of the conversation, had telecast the contents on February 12.

An analysis of the Call Transcription in the Preliminary Enquiry (PE) no. 1(A) 13/AC-III/ New Delhi now shows that prosecutor Singh, by his own admission, had been in communication with Mr. Balwa either directly or through a third party. Mr. Singh further cited judgments favouring the accused, obliquely suggesting that these should be used by defence counsel to destroy the prosecution’s case.

An investigative story by The Hindu ‘Right under Supreme Court’s nose, conspiracy hatched to destroy 2G case’ published on February 13, 2012, had shown that DoT officials named in the tapes — B.B. Singh, then DDG Licence Fee, and A.K. Srivastav, then DDG Access Services — had a crucial exchange three days before the 2G scam, which was perpetrated on January 7, 2008.

Mr. B.B. Singh had alerted Mr. Srivastav that the paid-up capital required for a pan-India licence was Rs. 138 crore and not Rs. 10 crore. Despite 85 licensees becoming ineligible on this account, Mr. Srivastav processed their applications, enabling them to fraudulently access LoIs and later, spectrum.

These revelations throw up previously unknown acts of omission and commission of individuals in positions of authority — both within and outside the CBI — who have systematically been compromising the CBI case. This evidence additionally calls for a review of some government witnesses/approvers, since the full call transcripts reveal that they may have committed illegal acts, independent of ex-Telecom Minister A. Raja, his Personal Secretary R.K. Chandolia and the then Telecom Secretary S. Behura — so far, the only three accused from the Telecom Ministry.

It now turns out that CBI prosecutor Singh, who admits to being in regular dialogue with Mr. Balwa, was worried that the latter following a different legal strategy could damage his own attempts to help out Mr. Chandra and possibly others as well.

While discussing the case, Mr. Singh allegedly told Mr. Chandra (Hindi to English translation of call transcription): “Balwa is damaging the trial. God give him wisdom. He is preparing a noose around his neck and also damaging others alongside... don’t know… Have explained to him a thousand times…”

Chandra: “He has improved in comparison to the past...”

Singh: “Don’t know what is the problem, can’t fathom. I… don’t know, what he thinks of himself? …a little… has to be told…”

Despite Mr. Chandra’s assurance that Mr. Balwa had improved, Mr. Singh remained unconvinced and sceptical.

There is good reason for Mr. Singh and Mr. Chandra to worry about Mr. Balwa. The 63-page CBI charge sheet, dated April 2, 2011, co-accuses Unitech (Chandra) and Swan (Balwa), under each of the five charges relating to “(A) Investigation about Cut-off date, (B) Investigation into violation of First-Come-First-Served Policy, (C) Dual Technology Approvals and Spectrum Allocation, (D) Eligibility of Companies, and (E) Cheating the Government Exchequer by Non-Revision of Entry Fee.” Most of the charges are identical, though Mr. Chandra is an accused under Section 420 of the IPC, while Mr. Balwa is accused of offences punishable under Sections 420, 468 and 471 of the IPC.

Another part of the call transcript, which has not been aired in its entirety so far, relates to the favourable judgments that Mr. Singh is citing which, according to him, if used after securing the testimony of the government’s star witness, Mr. Srivastav, will not only overrule all other government witnesses but will eventually destroy the case altogether.

(Hindi to English translation of call transcription):

A.K. Singh: “Yes…Srivastav will state that Sir, for DoT, the approval of the shareholders is mandatory before the application…. and that…. its prima facie a company.”

Chandra: “That’s all?”

Singh: “After looking, this is what he will state…”

Chandra: “Rao sahib can get our work done. There is no problem…”

Singh: “Kambuj is a third person. His findings are not binding on DoT. For that, I have a brilliant judgment. Unlikely anyone else has that judgment, which states that the Department that formulates a guideline can interpret it in 10 different ways. Whatever is DoT’s understanding is being testified by their own witness and in future that alone will be sustainable. I dealt with a typical issue… In U.P., let me tell you… even though it’s extremely unfortunate that the entire defence counsel has not been able to cite this judgment. It’s an interesting judgment about petrol pumps of Indian Oil… in which…”

Mr. Singh assures Mr. Chandra, later in the same conversation, that he needn’t worry about Mr. Srivastav’s testimony since on the issue of eligibility, Mr. Srivastav would deliver an unabashed statement to help Mr. Chandra’s case.

The transcription further throws up a new character called “Rao sahib” who Mr. Chandra believes will assist in delivering government witness Srivastav’s testimony to dilute the case against Mr. Chandra.

These revelations, including that Mr. Singh is encouraging the defence lawyers to cite judgments against the prosecution while additionally assuring the accused of a favourable testimony from the prosecution’s star witness, show the extent to which the rot has set in the prosecution’s case, which is being heard daily in a special CBI court.

The last piece of evidence emerging from the Singh-Chandra exchange is on how to get past the eligibility accusation faced by Unitech in which Mr. Chandra feared an adverse testimony by Mr. Kambuj who prepared the RoC report. Investigation by The Hindu shows that Unitech, according to the CAG, had violated eligibility criteria across six different guidelines in each of its 22 applications. Altogether, the CAG pointed to 85 licences being in violation of the eligibility conditions (see chart on Page 1).

The Supreme Court’s order of December 16, 2010, invoking the CAG report, had expressly directed the CBI to investigate how ineligible companies received LoIs/licences, including the role of DoT officials in granting such licences. This was especially significant since out of 232 qualifying applications on the cut-off date of September 25, 2007, 110 were found ineligible by the same officials who allowed 85 faulty applications through the door.

Yet, the CBI charge sheet restricts its observations to Swan and Unitech, while ignoring the eligibility violations by Loop, Alliance, Videocon and S Tel, all of which, according to the CAG, were guilty of accessing spectrum fraudulently. The CBI charge sheet also makes no mention of guilty officials, who have all been converted into witnesses. It is unclear whether the officials who selectively processed ineligible applications did so independently or under directions from Mr. Raja.

This new evidence reveals that despite filing status reports through the CVC and being under the Supreme Court’s supervision, the prosecution’s case has been extensively damaged by the CBI’s weak charge sheets, aided by a team of compromised prosecutors and witnesses.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/more-skeletons-tumble-out-of-leaked-2g-call-transcripts/article4425555.ece?homepage=true

NEW DELHI, February 13, 2013
Under Supreme Court’s nose, conspiracy hatched to destroy 2G case

SHALINI SINGH

Tapes suggest prosecutor, accused and star witness colluded to vitiate SC directions to CBI

The exposure of an apparent conspiracy between the CBI prosecutor in the 2G scam investigation, A.K. Singh, and the accused Unitech Managing Director, Sanjay Chandra, could have grave consequences since it reveals a deliberate attempt to pull the wool over the Supreme Court’s eyes under whose supervision the entire investigation and prosecution has been occurring since December 16, 2010.

The leaked conversation leads the matter beyond the prosecutor and accused to involve star prosecution witness A.K. Srivastav, who was otherwise liable to face a jail term, along with the former Telecom Minister, A. Raja, the former DoT Secretary, S. Behura, and the former private secretary to Mr Raja, R.K. Chandolia.

The recordings suggest that Mr. Singh was colluding to help Mr. Chandra by not only discussing the CBI’s legal strategy but in fact overruling internal instructions on what questions to ask, pre-deciding their sequence to suit the accused and on whether to call B.B. Singh, DDG (Licence Fee) of the DoT’s Finance Division, for cross-questioning, versus A.K. Srivastav, DDG (Access Services). It is clear from the taped conversation that Mr. Singh and Mr. Chandra believe that using Mr. Srivastav’s testimony would help destroy the prosecution’s own case in three stages, including one that relates to Unitech obtaining licences and spectrum in spite of being ineligible.

The CAG, in its report of December 16, 2010, stated that 85 of the 122 licences granted to 13 companies by the DoT were ineligible. For Unitech, it detailed in pages 35-41, the manner in which the company had provided “false” and “fictitious” certificates on authorised share capital and misrepresented facts. The CAG said: “Their conditional registration by the ROC was a fraudulent act of these 6 companies with mala fide intention of obtaining the UAS licences for 20 service areas by misleading DoT.”

Slamming DoT officials as well, the CAG wrote: “It would thus appear that the DoT miserably failed to do the necessary due diligence in the examination of the applications of these applicants though they took more than 3-9 months to process these applications as against a prescribed period of 30 days.” It was Mr. Srivastav and his team which, while rejecting roughly 100 applications, certified these applications for grant of LoIs, overriding internal written warnings of the finance division on page 28 N of File No: 20-100/2007-AS-I.

SC direction vitiated

The Supreme Court, after hearing the PIL, which had forced the CBI to finally act in November 2010, leading to the arrest of Mr. Raja in February 2011, had specifically directed the CBI to investigate the issue of “ineligible applicants,” who fraudulently accessed licences.

The court, taking cognizance of the CAG report, also directed investigation against DoT officials involved in grant of licences to ineligible firms. It said: “The CBI shall conduct a thorough investigation into various issues highlighted in the report of the CVC which was forwarded to Director, CBI, vide letter dated 12-10-2009 and in the report of the CAG who have prima facie found serious irregularities in the grant of licences to 122 applicants, majority of whom are said to be ineligible, the blatant violation of terms and conditions of licence and huge loss to public exchequer running into several thousand crores. CBI should also probe how new licences were granted to large number of ineligible applicants and who was responsible for the same and why the TRAI and DoT did not take action against those licensees who sold their stake/equities for many thousand crores and also those who failed to fulfil rollout obligations and comply with other conditions of licence.”

This meant that the CBI should have indicted Mr. Srivastav and members of the AS cell. However, instead, the CBI turned him into the star government witness, closely mirroring an approver. The conspiracy of the quid pro quo, uncovered by the tapes, reveals that the testimony of the government witness was to be used to acquit a key accused with the help of a complicit prosecutor — who was focussed on what he would get paid if he was representing the corporates instead of the government. Mr. Chandra’s acquittal of charges of obtaining licences on ineligible applications would have collapsed the case while additionally exonerating DoT officials of charges of collusion.

CBI-Srivastav-Chandra collude

An investigation into the case files by The Hindu shows that Mr. Srivastav had bypassed written warnings by Mr. B. B. Singh, DDG (LF), whose name also appears in the tapes, that “accordingly all service areas licence equity required is Rs.138 crores and not ten crores as per the UASL guidelines 2005.” On January 7, 2008, Mr. Srivastav, ignoring this noting and the knowledge that several companies, especially Unitech, did not meet the criteria on the date of application i.e. September 24, 2007 (as was later disclosed by CAG), processed the file leading to grant of 122 LoIs, which included 22 granted to Unitech’s eight different companies. (See table).

The CAG, which discovered the fraud, said of Unitech in its December 16, 2010 audit report: “Eight applicants belonging to Unitech Group (Brand name Uninor) had been incorporated in August-September 2007 with an authorised share capital of 5 lakh each. All these eight companies passed the special resolutions for increase in the authorised share capital between 2 PM to 5 PM on 20 September 2007 in the extra-ordinary general meetings of the respective companies and deposited the requisite stamp duties on 3 October 2007 for increase in the authorised share capital. After they submitted the requisite applications along with the proof of payment of stamp duties on 5 October 2007, the certificate of the registration of the increase in the authorised share capital was issued by the ROC only on 8/11 October 2007. Thus the claim of the higher paid up capital of these companies on the date of submission i.e. 24 September and the supporting certificates of the company secretaries of these companies submitted along with their applications was false and fictitious.” The conspiracy was hatched to avoid prosecution of Mr. Chandra and DoT officials relating to this paragraph read with the SC directions of December 2010.

The conspiracy

In effect, an independent investigation and prosecution should have been launched against Mr. Srivastav and his officers. However, the CBI instead converted him into a prosecution witness. The CBI prosecutor is now using that favour to have him give statements which, according to Mr.A.K. Singh, is the only one that “will matter.” So despite contrary reports by officers of ROC (the leaked tape mentions one Mr. Kambuj), the case was to be destroyed using Mr. Srivastav’s testimony. Mr. Singh even cited a Supreme Court judgement to buttress this case in the alleged tele-conversation with Mr. Chandra.

The apparent conspiracy as recorded on tape appears to be an attempt to circumvent explicit directions of the Supreme Court, since the main accused within the DoT — Mr. Srivastav — has not been charged for processing 85 ineligible applications — including 22 of Unitech. And now, according to the tapes, the prosecutor, the prosecution witness and the accused are doing one another favours to deliver weak, pre-planned and favourable testimonies to dilute and eventually collapse the case which helps all parties, and most of all the government whose reputation is at stake. Since converting Mr. Srivastav into a prosecution witness rather than keeping him as a key accused remains within the discretionary powers of the CBI, it becomes clear as to why prosecutor Mr. Singh and the accused Mr. Chandra have such confidence in the favourable testimony of Mr. Srivastav in this sensitive case.



http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/under-supreme-courts-nose-conspiracy-hatched-to-destroy-2g-case/article4408402.ece