Aircel-Maxis: SC adjourns till tomorrow Swamy's plea in case against ED officer

The Supreme Court today adjourned for tomorrow the hearing of a plea filed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy seeking to be impleaded in a case against an Enforcement Directorate officer probing the Aircel-Maxis deal.

The top court found that the petitioner, who has filed the case against the officer alleging he had acquired disproportinate assets, was not represented through his counsel.

A vacation bench of Justices Arun Mishra and Sanjay Kishan Kaul asked Swamy to serve the copy of his application on petitioner Rajneesh Kapur and also personally inform him about the listing of the case tomorrow.

During the hearing, Swamy said that Kapur's petition had averments similar to what was stated in 2011 and apex court had dealt with those "scurrilous complaints" in its May 6, 2011 order in the 2G spectrum scam case. He said the apex court had then asked the officer to continue.

"All I want is that the ED officer should be allowed to continue till probe in the Aircel-Maxis deal case is over within the six-month deadline, as directed by the apex court on March 12," Swamy said.

The BJP leader said he also wanted to produce some evidence to show that the averments made in the writ petition were scurrilous in nature and submitted a report of a Hindi newspaper.

The bench told Swamy that one part of his prayer was for impleading himself to the writ petition filed by petitioner Kapur, while the other part dealt with allowing the officer to continue till the probe is completed.

"Yes, my lord. That's my prayer," Swamy replied.

The bench then found that neither Kapur, nor his counsel were present and asked Swamy whether the copy of his application was served upon the petitioner or not.

Swamy said the copy was served, but still no one has appeared on behalf of Kapur.

"Then we will take up the matter tomorrow and by then you serve the copy of application to him or his counsel and even personally inform him for appearing tomorrow," the bench said.

The top court said it would also take up for hearing tomorrow the petition filed by Rajeshwar Singh, who has sought initiation of contempt proceedings, as attempts have been made to scuttle or delay the ongoing investigation in the Aircel-Maxis case.

In his petition, Kapur has alleged that Singh, the investigating officer in the Aircel-Maxis case, had amassed disproportionate assets beyond the known sources of his income.

Swamy, who had earlier moved the apex court for expeditious probe in the Aircel-Maxis case, has sought court's direction for making himself as a party in the plea filed by Kapur against the ED official.

On June 20, Justice Indu Malhotra recused herself from hearing in the matter without assigning any reason.

The apex court had on March 12 set a deadline of six months for the CBI and the ED to complete the investigation into the alleged irregularities in FIPB approval given in the Aircel-Maxis deal case in which former Finance Minister P Chidambaram and his son Karti have been questioned by probe agencies.