ED issues summons to some telcos

The Enforcement Directorate has issued summons to certain telecom firms as part of its investigation into alleged irregularities in the allocation of 2G spectrum.

Summons have been issued to some new telecom firms asking for financial records and documents, according to official sources. However, the names of the companies could not be ascertained.

Nine firms, including Unitech Group (Uninor), Loop Telecom, Etisalat DB, Stel and Datacom (Videocon), had received new licences in 2008.

When contacted, Loop Telecom said it had received a note from ED earlier and had already replied to it. Most of the other new service providers said they had not received any official communication from ED yet.

The development came at a time when the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), in its report, had said as many as 85 new licences out of the 122 issued in 2008 were ineligible. The report also said issuance of new licences at a price fixed in 2001 had caused a loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore to the government.

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has already said it would look into the matter of ineligibility of new players. ED had also registered a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and was working in close cooperation with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

CBI is already investigating irregularities in 2G spectrum allocation and had seized documents from DoT. CBI had yesterday told the Supreme Court that it would complete its investigation and file a chargesheet within three months as it was examining transcripts relating to 5,000 calls (out of which 3,800 have been analysed), 6,000 files and 80,000 pages of documents.