Supreme court notice to Satyam fraud accused on CBI plea to cancel bail

The Supreme Court today issued notices to Price Waterhouse (PW) partner Subramani Gopalakrishnan and Satyam Computers' former auditor VS Prabhakar Gupta over a CBI plea seeking cancellation of their bail granted by the Andhra Pradesh high court.

A bench of justices P Sathasivam and BS Chauhan issued notices to Gopalakrishnan and Gupta seeking their replies to the CBI plea.

Appearing for the CBI, additional solicitor general HP Rawal said the apex court had already cancelled the bail granted to B Ramalinga Raju, the founding chairman of Satyam Computers (now Mahindra Satyam) and five others.

Accordingly, the bail granted to Gopalakrishnan and Gupta too should be cancelled on the basis of the apex court's order, Rawal pleaded before the court.

Appearing for Gopalkrishnan, senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi opposed the CBI plea, contending that the investigating agency has come to the apex court almost ten
months after the high court granted bail to his client.

He said the high court had given the bail in June 2010 and the probe agency is opposing the grant of bail to his client here in April 2011.

He said there was not a single allegation against his client of trying to tamper with evidence or influencing witnesses, warranting cancellation of bail.

"The special court constituted on the direction of the Supreme Court has already completed up to 75 per cent of the trial. We should wait for them," Rohatgi said.