New Delhi, Mar 16 (PTI) Former Telecom Minister Dayanidhi Maran and his brother Kalanithi Maran today filed separate pleas challenging the jurisdiction of special 2G court to try the Aircel-Maxis deal case in which they have been summoned as accused along with six others.
The move by Maran brothers came a month after the Supreme Court on February 9 had disallowed them from approaching Delhi High Court against the special court's order summoning them as accused in the case arising out of probe into the 2G spectrum allocation scam.
The apex court had said that the Marans could state before the special court that Aircel-Maxis case was not part of the 2G spectrum scam and cannot be heard by the designated judge who has been nominated to exclusively deal with cases arising out of the 2G scam.
Marans had submitted before the apex court that their right under the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and Article 226 to approach the High Court cannot be curtailed and they would establish that their case stood on different footing than that of 2G cases.
The Maran brothers today appeared before Special CBI Judge O P Saini and filed pleas challenging the jurisdiction of the special court to try the case.
The court issued notice to the CBI on the pleas and fixed the matter for hearing on August 3.
"Accused number one and accused number two (Dayanidhi and Kalanithi) have filed separate applications challenging the jurisdiction of court to try the case," the court said.
The CBI also filed its reply to the bail petitions of the Marans which was fixed for arguments on August 3, the next date of hearing.
During the hearing, senior public prosecutor K K Goel told the court that fresh summons should be issued against the four other accused, Malaysian business tycoon T Ananda Krishnan, Malaysian national Augustus Ralph Marshall and two accused firms, as the summons issued against them earlier could not be served upon them.
The prosecutor said that they need atleast three months time to serve the summons to these accused. "We are helpless. We need time. This will be done through diplomatic channel," the prosecutor said.
The court also issued fresh summons to these four accused saying, "since the process of four accused have returned unserved, an application has been filed for issuance of fresh summons."
"Accordingly, issue fresh process for these four accused returnable for August 3," the judge said.
The court after hearing the submissions posted the matter for August 3 for hearing arguments on the bail pleas of the Maran brothers, their plea challenging the jurisdiction of the court to try the case and the process of serving the summons to the Malaysia-based accused.
Maran brothers and authorised representatives of the accused firm Sun Direct TV Pvt Ltd were present in the court during the hearing.
Besides the Maran brothers, T Ananda Krishnan and Augustus Ralph Marshall, the court had summoned four companies -- Sun Direct TV Pvt Ltd, Maxis Communication Berhad, South Asia Entertainment Holding Ltd and Astro All Asia Network PLC -- as accused in the case.
The court had on October 29 last year summoned all the eight as accused after taking cognisance of the CBI's charge sheet filed in the case.
CBI had chargesheeted them for the offences punishable under section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC and under relevant provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
On August 29 last year, the CBI had filed the charge sheet in the case containing the names of 151 prosecution witnesses and a set of 655 documents, on which it has relied upon during its probe.
CBI had alleged in the court that Dayanidhi Maran had "pressured" and "forced" Chennai-based telecom promoter C Sivasankaran to sell his stakes in Aircel and two subsidiary firms to Malaysian firm Maxis Group in 2006.
