New Delhi, Apr 20: Unitech's managing director Sanjay Chandra used to frequent the residence of former telecom minister A Raja in 2007, Aseervatham Achary, former additional private secretary of the disgraced minister, has recorded before a magistrate. He also saw Shahid Balwa visiting the then telecom minister's official residence on many occasion.
"I saw Sanjay Chandra of Unitech visiting the residence of A Raja in and around September-October 2007. As regards Shahid Balwa or any other person connected with Swan Telecom, I state that Shahid Balwa was a frequent visitor to the residence camp office of A Raja," Achary said in the statement recorded under Section 164 CrPC.
He further stated that during the period when Raja was environment and forests minister, Vinod Goenka and Shahid Balwa had become very close to him. They were regular visitors of Raja and in direct contact with R K Chandolia, Raja's former PS who is in Tihar jail presently.
His statement backs CBI theory that the alleged companies were working in tandem with Raja. According to those in the know of investigations, Achary has provided several clinching details to help CBI piece together the conspiracy behind the 2G scam, including Raja's proximity with most of the important private sector players.
CBI's claim of Swan Telecom being the front of Reliance ADAG has been backed by the former company secretary of Swan Telecom Deodutt Pandit, who made a statement before the magistrate that he had forged documents in October 2007 to show that shares from a Reliance ADAG firm “ Giraffe “ were transferred to Shahid Balwa's DB Realty in February 2007. "I prepared the minutes on the basis of share transfer applications provided by Asif Balwa, another director of Swan Telecom," he told the magistrate.
Pandit also claimed that Swan was transferred to DB Realty and its records and details related to shareholdings were maintained in digital form.
Another important witness of CBI, Ashish Karyekar, former Reliance ADAG executive, has claimed that Swan was "fraudulently transferred" from Reliance to the DB Realty group, to make it eligible for 2G licence and spectrum. Otherwise, it would have violated the ruling prohibiting a telecom operator from holding more than 10% stake in another operator in the same circle.
In his statement under Section 164 CrPC, Karyekar claimed that he never signed the board meeting papers. "No board meeting of Giraffe Consultancy took pace on February 25, 2007. I don't know who prepared the forged minutes of Giraffe, as these might have been prepared after Giraffe Consultancy was taken over by the DB Group," he told the magistrate. Giraffe was promoted by Reliance Energy Management Services.
He stated that no meeting took place between January 31, 2007 and March 28, 2007. "No board meeting had taken place on February 27, 2005 wherein Powersurfer Interactive and Reliance Energy Management Services purportedly transferred shares of the company to six persons including Ujwal Mehta, Faiyaz Ahmed and others. "The six persons are not known to me and I have never met them," Karyekar said. About the meeting in which he was shown present on February 25, 2007, Karyekar stated it was not his signatures and it must have been forged.
