Found nothing against Chidambaram, others in 63 Moons Tech's complaint: CBI

CBI lawyer Hiten Venegavkar told the court that the complaint filed by the firm has been forwarded to the Chief Vigilance Officer of the Department of Economic Affairs

The CBI on Thursday told the Bombay High Court that it did not find any material to substantiate the allegations made by 63 Moons Technologies against former finance minister P Chidambaram and two others.

CBI lawyer Hiten Venegavkar told a division bench of Justices Sadhana Jadhav and N J Jamadar that the complaint filed by the firm has been forwarded to the Chief Vigilance Officer of the Department of Economic Affairs.

The court was hearing a petition filed by the Jignesh Shah-promoted company, earlier known as Financial Technologies Ltd, questioning "delayed" action by the Central Bureau of Investigation against Chidambaram and bureaucrats K P Krishnan and Ramesh Abhishek.

On February 15, 2019, 63 Moons Technologies filed a complaint with the CBI. It alleged that the senior Congress leader and the other two abused their official positions and caused damage to the company when the multi-crore payment default scam at National Spot Exchange Limited (NSEL) came to light.

Chidambaram was finance minister, Abhishek was chairman of the Forward Markets Commission and Krishnan an additional secretary and joint secretary in the Ministry of Finance when the scam came to light in 2012-13.

The trio took "malicious and malafide" action against it, the company alleged.

Advocate Venegavkar said the CBI verified the complaint, but "we have not found any material as of now to substantiate the allegations made by the petitioner".

The CBI also said in an affidavit that the petitioner did not submit any supporting documents.

"In the absence of any supporting documents in support of the allegations and due to the technical nature of the complaint, the same has been forwarded to the Chief Vigilance Officer, Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance for expert examinations," the affidavit said.

"It was informed in the letter dated February 25, 2020 that the matter may be reverted to CBI along with due approval of the competent authority under section 17 (A) of the Prevention of Corruption Act for taking up formal investigation," it said.

Till then, the agency cannot conduct any probe, the affidavit added.

Senior counsel Aabad Ponda, appearing for 63 Moons, argued that as the complaint alleges corruption and criminal conspiracy at high level, an inquiry must be conducted.

The hearing was adjourned for three months.