Subramanian Swamy should have filed complaint in court, attorney general tells Supreme Court.
Prime minister Manmohan Singh was not obliged under law to give sanction for prosecution of former telecom minister A Raja in the spectrum scandal merely on the basis of a letter, the government told the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
Referring to former MP Subramanian Swamy’s letter to prime minister seeking sanction for launching prosecution against Raja, attorney-general (AG) Goolam Vahanvati said, “What Dr Swamy was asking for was totally inconceivable under the law”.
Vahanvati told the apex court bench of justices GS Singhvi and AK Ganguly that Swamy sought “sanction for prosecution even without filing a complaint before the competent court... In such circumstances, the question of sanction cannot and does not arise,” the AG said.
Taking exception to Vahanvati’s argument, Swamy said he could have moved a court but moving the prime minister’s office was an option for him which he resorted to. “Why should I act on the AG’s advice?” he said.
The court felt that the maximum time for responding to a plea for sanction should be three months as laid down in the Jain-Hawala case, but it also wanted the AG to say what the government thinks should be the outer limit. To this, the AG said prima facie the period should be six months.
The bench, that’s also seized of the petition filed by the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), seeking setting up a court-monitored special investigating team to investigate the spectrum allocation also asked the AG to submit details of the number of sanctions that are pending for a long time.
The direction came after CPIL counsel Bhushan said that authorities are dragging their feet over prosecuting corrupt bureaucrats and individuals. He sought the court’s intervention in the matter and for making fresh directions in the light of the apex court’s judgment in the Jain-Hawala case.
Hearing the fate of corruption cases against the big fishes, the bench observed that the executive hasn’t taken any action in many areas which affect the life of people; corruption being one.
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