SC cancels bail to PWC partner, Satyam audit head

The Supreme Court today cancelled the bails granted to Price Waterhouse partner Subramani Gopalakrishnan and Satyam's internal auditor V S Prabhakar Gupta, directing them to surrender by April 30.

A bench comprising Justice P Sathasivam and Justice B S Chauhan cancelled their bail and directed them to surrender within this period, failing which the central investigative agency will take steps to arrest them.

The apex court, which had on April 18 reserved its order, said it was cancelling the bail of the accused after looking into allegations in the chargesheet filed by the CBI.

The orders were passed on CBI's plea seeking cancellation of bail granted to Gopalakrishnan, partner of the global auditing firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and Gupta, internal audit head of the scam-hit IT firm Satyam Computers.

The CBI had challenged the bail granted to Gopalakrishnan and Gupta, both accused in the allegedly Rs 14,000 crore- Satyam scam, by the Andhra Pradesh High Court in June 2010.

Its plea was opposed by the counsels appearing for Gopalakrishnan and Gupta, who submitted that the investigating agency had approached the apex court ten months after the order passed by high court.

They further submitted that the Supreme Court had already given bail to one of the PWC auditors of Satyam- Talluri Srinivas- even as the CBI is seeking to send another auditor Gopalkrishnan behind the bars.

However, CBI contended this, saying there was difference in the role of Talluri Srinivas and Gopalkrishnan in the Satyam case.

"Talluri was (there)for the period of last one year. He merely followed the principles of Gopalkrishnan. Gopalkrishnan has take exorbitant fee from the company (Satyam). He even took charges for other services... It may be that the money was to help them (Raju) in conspiracy," said  Additional Solicitor General H P Rawal appearing for CBI.

The bench also agreed and said "both (Talluri and Gopalkrishnan) are on different footing. It cannot be a precedent".

The Supreme Court on October 26 last year had also cancelled the bail granted to B Ramalinga Raju, the founding chairman of Satyam Computers (now Mahindra Satyam), and five others.