Thursday, 18 April 2013 | J Gopikrishnan | New Delhi
Notwithstanding its claims of functioning independently, the CBI apparently doesn't dare to issue even a Press release to the media on its own without keeping the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) informed.
An email of a draft Press release sent by the agency to the PMO a full 12 hours before issuing it to the Press on Tuesday bears testimony to this fact.
Following reports about Law Minister Ashwani Kumar having vetted the CBI's probe status report on Coalgate before it was submitted to the Supreme Court, the agency had issued the release to claim that it was under no pressure from the Government.
The release was mailed on April 15 (Monday) to K Muthu Kumar, officer on special duty (OSD) to the Prime Minister; Sharat Chander, director (media & communication) of PMO and Neelam Kapur, the chief Government spokesperson and head of Press Information Bureau.
The copy of the email communication, available with The Pioneer, shows that CBI's Press information section on April 15 at 11.51 pm sent the Press release to PMO officials and PIB officials. The release was issued the next day, April 16 (Tuesday).
The Press release said: "Reports have been and are being, published/telecast in a section of the media, speculating about the nature and content of an affidavit to be filed by the CBI before the Hon'ble Supreme Court, in connection with the Coal allocation probe.
"It is reiterated that CBI is yet to file the said affidavit. The CBI will strictly abide by the directions of the Supreme Court, and is not under any pressure from any quarter."
When contacted, CBI spokesperson Dharini Mishra said, "We sent the release through cbipressinfosection@gmail.com since the NIC server was not working. PIB PMO picked it up and further passed it on. All our Press releases are routinely sent to PIB."
On a question if the release was vetted by the PMO before being released to the Media, she said, "The question of the Press release being vetted by PMO does not arise".
When asked to respond on this matter, a PMO official said, "This is a routine matter." However, he did not elaborate on why PMO officials have to see even the press release of the CBI before its release to the media.
Comment
Ravi Kumar • 5 hours ago −
What more evidence needed to prove CBI is totally under Prime MInister, who is completely under 10 Janpath residents - Sonia and Rahul. A former CBI Director was the person who found land for Priyana Gandhi in restricted Shimla. The current CBI Director who saluted Lau Prasad Yadav will crawl before Mother, Son, Daughter and 420 Damad
http://www.dailypioneer.com/nation/pmo-gets-cbi-press-note-first-media-later.html
SC WANTS AIRCEL-MAXIS PROBE OVER BY JULY
Thursday, 18 April 2013 | PNS | New Delhi
The Supreme Court on Wednesday fixed July 2013 deadline for the CBI to complete its probe into the irregularities in the Aircel-Maxis deal involving the then Telecom Minister Dayanidhi Maran.
The CBI's investigation into the case got held up on account of non-cooperation by Malaysian Government and Mauritius on the letters rogatory seeking details about Malaysian-based company Maxis, owned and operated by business tycoon T Ananda Krishnan. Maran, who was the Telecom Minister between February 2004 and May 2007 was accused of arm-twisting Aircel to sell majority stake to Maxis. As a quid pro quo, CBI trailed investment by Maxis into Sun Network, owned by Marans.
In its latest status report submitted to Court, CBI counsel senior advocate KK Venugopal showed "little progress" made by the agency following its meeting with the Malaysian Attorney General on March 21 this year. However, the Malaysian Government has adopted a procedure requiring sanction from the country's Law Minister to supply any information in response to CBI's letter rogatory.
The CBI status report came in response to an application filed by Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy who added another dimension to the deal accusing the then Finance Minister P Chidambaram of wrongly approving FIPB clearance for the said deal. As per the norms, only 74 per cent of foreign investment was permissible in telecom sector but the Malaysian company Maxis' declaration to their home stock exchange exposed that they have acquired more than 99 per cent in Aircel.
The bench of Justices GS Singhvi and KS Radhakrishnan told the CBI that the probe cannot be "indefinite" and clarified that in the event the foreign state did not cooperate, the CBI may consider filing its investigation report by July. The Court fixed the matter for further monitoring in the second week of July.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/nation/sc-wants-aircel-maxis-probe-over-by-july.html