Aircel-Maxis deal: Supreme Court asks Marans to raise it before Special Court

New Delhi, Feb 9: Supreme Court today disallowed DMK's Dayanidhi Maran and his brother Kalanithi from approaching Delhi High Court against the special CBI court order summoning them as accused in Aircel-Maxis case arising out of the probe into the 2G spectrum allocation scam.

The apex court said the Marans could state before the Special Court that the Aircel-Maxis case was not part of the 2G spectrum scam and therefore cannot be heard by the designated judge who has been nominated to hold prosecution of the cases exclusively arising out of the 2G scam.

"We make it clear that we are not giving any liberty to petitioners (Maran brothers) to approach the Delhi High Court but the special court would decide the juridictional issue raised by the petitioners," a bench comprising Justices V Gopalagowda and R Banumathi said.

The bench said it was restoring the recalled order of February 6 to the extent only that their petitions were declared disposed of as withdrawn while making it clear that there was no liberty to approach the High Court.

Hours after declining to entertain the plea of former Telecom Minister Dayanidhi Maran and his brother Kalanithi Maran in the Aircel-Maxis case and asking them to approach the High Court against the trial court order summoning them as accused, the bench had recalled its order on February 6.

The order was recalled after the CBI mentioned that the apex court judgements and orders were clear that no court, other than the top court, was entitled to hear any appeal arising out of the 2G scam cases.

However, the Chief Justice of India had then asked the bench to look the issue afresh. The bench, after hearing all the parties, passed the order with the observation "we are not inclined to pronounce judgement that whether it (Aircel-Maxis case) is 2G case or not.

You have to go before the Special Court and agitate there and get an order". "We are bound by the judgements of this court. We can neither deviate nor differ.

If we differ, we have to refer it to a larger bench," the bench said.

The observation came after considering CBI's submission by its senior advocate K K Venugopal, who argued that there were series of apex court judgements since 2011 that appeals arising out of the 2G cases cannot be heard by any court other than the apex court.

PTI