‘A Raja had not consulted me while sending letter to PM’
11 Dec 2012 8:33 AM IST
K Sridhara, former Member (Technology) of Department of Telecom (DoT), on Monday, told the Special Court trying 2G case that former Telecom Minister A Raja had not consulted him during preparation of the letter sent to the Prime Minister on 27 December, 2007.
‘I have been shown letter dated December 26, 2007.... written by the then Minister to the Prime Minister.’As member (Technology), I was not consulted either before the preparation of letter or during the process of preparation of the letter itself,’ he told Special CBI Judge O P Saini while deposing as a prosecution witness in the spectrum allocation case.
Sridhara deposed that he came to know about the December 26, 2007 letter when it was placed in the file of the department after sometime. On the issue of issuance of licences in bulk to eligible telecom firms on January 10, 2008, he said Raja had given the logic that ‘if more licences were given, there would be more competition and hence the tariff would come down and also that it would avoid possibility of any trading of licences.’
While being cross-examined, he said till October 1, 2007, a total of about 575 applications were received by the DoT for grant of UASL, and it was the view of then Telecom Secretary D S Mathur that letters of intents (LoIs) could not be issued to all the applicants because of non-availability of spectrum.On being asked by senior advocate and Raja’s counsel Sushil Kumar about a November 2, 2007 meeting chaired by the then telecom minister, Sridhara said he was also present there and it was decided that the existing policy, as suggested by the then telecom secretary, be followed for grant of UASL.
He said as the number of applicants was very large, if the applications were taken one by one, it would have taken about a month in the processing of one application and total delay would have beenof eight to nine months.
‘I have been shown letter dated December 26, 2007.... written by the then Minister to the Prime Minister.’As member (Technology), I was not consulted either before the preparation of letter or during the process of preparation of the letter itself,’ he told Special CBI Judge O P Saini while deposing as a prosecution witness in the spectrum allocation case.
Sridhara deposed that he came to know about the December 26, 2007 letter when it was placed in the file of the department after sometime. On the issue of issuance of licences in bulk to eligible telecom firms on January 10, 2008, he said Raja had given the logic that ‘if more licences were given, there would be more competition and hence the tariff would come down and also that it would avoid possibility of any trading of licences.’
While being cross-examined, he said till October 1, 2007, a total of about 575 applications were received by the DoT for grant of UASL, and it was the view of then Telecom Secretary D S Mathur that letters of intents (LoIs) could not be issued to all the applicants because of non-availability of spectrum.On being asked by senior advocate and Raja’s counsel Sushil Kumar about a November 2, 2007 meeting chaired by the then telecom minister, Sridhara said he was also present there and it was decided that the existing policy, as suggested by the then telecom secretary, be followed for grant of UASL.
He said as the number of applicants was very large, if the applications were taken one by one, it would have taken about a month in the processing of one application and total delay would have beenof eight to nine months.
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