A Raja was acquitted by a special court in the 2G spectrum allocation cases (PTI)
Following his acquittal in the
"2G scam" case by a trial court today, former telecom minister A Raja said that his actions brought a "revolution" in India's telecom sector. He further added that his actions were for the benefit of the masses, the poor in particular.
Mr Raja was the telecom minister in the Congress-led UPA government when 122 telecom spectrum licences were issued to eight companies in 2008 on first-come-first-serve basis. "I brought a revolution in the telecom sector. It is not unknown to the history that a person who did a revolution is often termed as a criminal," Mr Raja said in a statement.
He said his decision to allocate second generation or 2G licences, helped bring competition in the telecom sector driving mobile call charges to rock-bottom levels. Also, his actions were in line with the National Telecom Policy as well as the recommendations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, he said.
Mr Raja, Kanimozhi of the DMK and 15 others accused were today acquitted in the politically-sensitive 2G spectrum allocation cases
by a special court which held that the prosecution "miserably failed" to prove that Mr Raja and other officials conspired to receive kickbacks from the sale of phone permits.
"My firm belief in the rightfulness of my actions as well as my faith in our nation's justice system has been validated today," he said. "I have felt somewhat vindicated all along even prior to this judgement because the beneficial results of my actions are evident to and being enjoyed by the nation's public."
Further, Mr Raja debunked the presumptive loss theories in the allocation. In its charge sheet filed in April 2011 against Mr Raja and others, CBI had alleged that there was a loss of Rs 30,984 crore to the exchequer in allocation of 122 licences for 2G spectrum which were scrapped by the Supreme Court on February 2, 2012.
The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) had put the loss to the exchequer at Rs 1.76 lakh crore.
Mr Raja, a leader of Tamil Nadu-based DMK party, which was an ally in the Congress-led UPA government, blamed vested interests for propagating the presumptive loss theory.
"Vested interests manipulated public perception by leveraging the media and sensationalising fabricated allegations," he said. "It has been repeatedly proven that the presumptive loss to the exchequer which formed the basis for the conspiracy theorists to run amok, was cooked-up."
"I also had the courage and confidence to step into the witness box and gave evidence and offered myself for cross examination by the CBI, which is very unusual in criminal trials in India," he said.
Raja claimed that the trial court judge had repeatedly observed that his evidence was "cogent, credible and consistent with the official records, in contrast with the evidence of the prosecution witnesses whose evidence has been rejected as untrustworthy".
"The learned Judge has held that it is not just a case of the prosecution failing to prove its allegations, but a case where the prosecution case itself was false, which was my submission from the very first day," he added.