New Delhi:
The lawyers of the promoters of Loop Telecom and Essar Group appeared before the Patiala House court in Delhi today in connection with the 2G case. The promoters, Ravi Ruia and Anshuman Ruia, promoters of Essar, I P Khaitan and Kiran Khaitan, promoters of Loop Telecom, and Vikas Saraf, Director (Strategy and Planning), Essar, failed to appear yet again.
The court granted them exemption from personal appearance after their lawyers argued that the CBI had not issued the summons "properly". This was in fact the second time they were issued summons by the court.
The court will now hear the case on March 17.
Ruias and Khaitans, along with their companies, were summoned after the CBI named them in the third chargesheet filed in the 2G case.
Their companies have been accused by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) of criminal conspiracy; Essar allegedly used Loop as a front in 2008 to acquire more licenses and spectrum than legally permissible.
The telecom scam centres on whether some of India's biggest companies conspired with politicians and bureaucrats to buy mobile network licenses and spectrum or airwaves as throwaway prices.
Interestingly, they've only been charged under the IPC and not under the Prevention of Corruption Act, unlike the other 17 accused in the case.
Loop and Essar have challenged the jurisdiction of the Special CBI court trying the 2G case, saying their case should be heard by a magistrate's court instead. That petition is pending in the Supreme Court which refused to stay the summons against the companies and their top bosses.
During the last hearing, the Ruias and Khaitans were not present. Lawyers who are representing their companies, though not the individuals themselves, said they had not been served summons at their official residences in Dubai - the four promoters of Loop and Essar are NRIs or non-resident Indians.