Apex court issues contempt notice to Subrata Roy

SC says allegation against Sahara chief for interfering in the probe in 2G scam is 'maintainable'

The Supreme Court today held that the plea against Subrata Roy for allegedly interfering with the probe in 2G scam is maintainable, in more trouble to Sahara Chief who is facing the heat of the court for not refunding investors' money.

A bench of Justice G S Singhvi and K S Radhakrishnan also issued notice to Roy and his two employees, who were working with his news channel, seeking their response on why probe be not initiated against them.

The court passed the order on a petition filed by Enforcement Directorate's (ED) Investigating Officer Rajeshwar Singh, who is probing the multi-crore scam, alleging that the two journalists-- Upendra Rai and Subodh Jain-- had threatened and blackmailed him.

Rajeshwar Singh in his petition has sought contempt action against Roy and the two scribes for allegedly interfering with the investigation of the 2G spectrum case.

On May 6, 2011, the apex court had said prima facie it was of the view that an attempt was made to interfere with the investigation conducted by Singh in what has been described as 2G spectrum scam case and related matters.

The bench had also banned Sahara India news network and its sister concerns from publishing and broadcasting any story or programme relating to Singh in response to 25 questions sent by Subodh Jain to ED official.

Jain had sent 25 questions to Singh seeking his reply to them. Some of the questions were personal in nature.

The court had observed that this was an attempt to blackmail Singh as it was done after Sahara India chief was served with summons by the ED to appear before it in connection with the investigation into the 2G scam.

The summons were issued under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

The apex court had earlier restrained Roy from leaving the country and also restrained him from selling any of the properties of the Sahara Group.

The court had said its order for handing over title deeds of group's properties worth Rs 20,000 crore to SEBI was not followed in "letter and spirit".