New Delhi: The CBI was on Monday directed by a Delhi court to file Law Ministry report which said that a firm should have more than 10 per cent stakes in another for being termed an associate, a plea taken by the 2G scam accused Reliance Telecom and Swan Telecom.
"It is ordered that CBI would place a copy of the report received by it from Ministry of Law and Justice through Department of Telecommunication (DoT) on record on September 21, the next date of hearing," Special CBI Judge O P Saini said.
Reliance Telecom Ltd (RTL) and Swan Telecom Private Ltd (STPL), an alleged beneficiary of the scam, have been taking the defence that they were not "associate" firms as RTL's stake in STPL was below 10 per cent, as mandated under the guidelines for the Unified Access Service (UAS) Licenses.
Essar Telecom, which allegedly created Loop Telecom as its front company to get licenses, has taken the same plea.
"No single company/legal person either directly, or through its associates, shall have substantial equity holding in more than one licensee company in the same service area for the Access Services namely: Basic, Cellular and the UAS.
'Substantial equity' herein will mean 'an equity of 10 per cent or more'. A promoter company/legal person cannot have stakes in more than one licensee company for the same service area," the UASL guidelines said.
CBI, on the other hand, has been alleging that STPL was an associate firm of RTL created to circumvent the then guidelines of DoT which debarred existing CDMA players from venturing into GSM segment.
RTL later passed on the control of STPL to promoter and co-accused Shahid Usman Balwa after the DoT allowed it to avail the facility of dual technology, the agency said.
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