HC junks Behura bail plea

Ex-telecom secy part of the core of the conspiracy

The Delhi High Court on Friday dismissed the bail plea of former telecom secretary Siddhartha Behura,saying that he,along with his mentor former telecom minister A Raja and the ministers former private secretary R K Chandolia,constituted the core of the conspiracy in the 2G spectrum allocation case.

Making a distinction between the two classes of accused,one comprising Raja,Behura and Chandolia who fell under the category of the public servants,and another comprising 14 other co-accused,including DMK MP Kanimozhi,the court said that Behura could not seek parity with the 10 accused,who have been released on bail either by the high court or Supreme Court.

Justice V K Shali dismissed Behuras contention that he stood at parity with all the other accused in the case since all of them had been charged under the common penal offences. I feel the petitioner,being a public servant, was under a higher degree of probity and duty as he was holder of a public trust and therefore,he was expected to discharge his duties with a more sense of responsibility,transparency and integrity, he said.

Turning down the submission by Behuras counsel that there could not be any distinction of the applicability of Section 409 (criminal breach of trust) among the accused as it made public and private persons equally culpable,the judge held that the charge against him was an aggravated form of breach of trust,which carries maximum punishment of life imprisonment.

The distinction of all the accused persons being responsible for the same punishment is,in my view,not tenable because admittedly the role of the petitioner is that of a core group,consisting of A-1 (Raja) to A-3 (Chandolia) as well as who are the actual perpetrators,while as the remaining persons were only accessories in the same,whose cases are distinguishable, reasoned the court.

According a birds eye view of the evidence,Justice Shali noted: If A-1 (Raja) can be said to be the kingpin or a pivot of the alleged conspiracy to commit the offence of breach of trust and cheating,then certainly the role of the petitioner and A-3 (Chandolia) has been that of a propeller of giving effect to the said idea of committing the offences so far as the allocation of 2G spectrum or Unified Access Services is concerned.

The judge,referring to statements of a few prosecution witnesses,said that prima facie there was ample evidence that they have been the core of the conspiracy in implementation of the policy of first come and the first basis in a distorted manner so as to cause benefits to specific parties.