A special court in Delhi granted anticipatory bail to former finance minister P Chidambaram and his son Karti in both ED and CBI cases in the Aircel-Maxis deal.
Chidambaram is already in CBI custody in connection with the INX Media money laundering case.
The order by the Delhi court comes as a slight relief for the Congress leader as the Supreme Court had earlier in the day dismissed an appeal of Chidambaram against the Delhi High Court’s order rejecting his anticipatory bail plea in a case being probed by Enforcement Directorate (ED) in INX Media case.
Now, the former finance minister faces arrest by the ED over corruption allegations in the INX Media case.
The Rs. 3,500-crore Aircel-Maxis deal involves clearance of $800 million foreign investment in 2006, allegedly in exchange of kickbacks.
The CBI and the ED are investigating how Karti Chidambaram allegedly managed to get clearance from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) in the Aircel-Maxis deal when his father was the Union Finance Minister in 2006.
Immediately after the relief granted by the Delhi court on Thursday, Karti tweeted, “We win some too”.
“As I have been saying it’s a non-case. Been dragged into only due to political vendetta. I have no connection to Aircel Maxis or to FIPB. I had an Aircel sim though. And in time this INX bogey will also be slayed,” he wrote in another tweet.
As I have been saying it’s a non case. Been dragged into only due to political vendetta. I have no connection to Aircel Maxis or to FIPB. I had an Aircel sim though 🙂 and in time this INX bogey will also be slayed https://t.co/aXW1AbDZkn
— Karti P Chidambaram (@KartiPC) September 5, 2019
Meanwhile, protection was given to the Chidambarams on the conditions that they will cooperate with the probe agencies, that they should not influence the witnesses or tamper the evidence and that they should not leave the country without the court’s permission.
The ED, in September 2017, had attached assets worth Rs 1.16 crore of Karti, who is under probe for allegedly receiving kickbacks in lieu of the FIPB clearance.
The probe agency had on October 25, last year. filed a supplementary chargesheet against Chidambaram and eight others in Delhi’s Patiala House Court in the Aircel-Maxis money laundering case.
In its chargesheet filed earlier in the case against former telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran, his brother Kalanithi Maran and others, the agency had alleged that Chidambaram had granted an FIPB approval in March 2006 to Mauritius-based Global Communication Services Holdings Ltd, a subsidiary of Maxis.
The CBI is probing as to how Chidambaram, who was the Union finance minister in 2006, granted a Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) approval to a foreign firm when only the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) was empowered to do it.
It is also alleged that Karti Chidambaram illegally took service charges for getting the FIPB clearance to the INX Media for receiving funds from abroad worth Rs 305 crore.
The agency said its probe revealed that the case of the said FDI was “wrongly projected as an investment of Rs 180 crore so that it need not be sent to the CCEA to avoid a detailed scrutiny”.
ED probe revealed financial linkage of Karti and his father with these companies despite the “contradictory and evasive” responses of various people questioned in connection with the case.
Both P Chidambaram and Karti Chidambaram have denied the allegations levelled against them by the CBI and the ED.