New Delhi: The Supreme Court, which is monitoring the CBI's investigation into the telecom scam, has expressed its reservations about the stand taken by the government's regulator, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India or TRAI.
The scam centres around whether A Raja as Telecom Minister in 2008 cost the government thousands of crores by choosing to award licences at throwaway prices instead of auctioning second-generation or 2G frequency to companies who were allegedly ineligible.
In a report submitted recently, TRAI said that it had not recommended the auction of spectrum and that the loss caused by Mr Raja's allocation of spectrum cannot be correctly estimated as such a calculation would involve assumptions of future market conditions.
TRAI's stand boosted the case of Mr Raja and others in jail for the scam, and some have referred to it in their defence.
"We are surprised by the TRAI report. TRAI is a Regulatory body created by Parliament. TRAI is supposed to be a regulator. What they have done is debatable," the judges hearing the case said.
While the government's auditor -the Comptroller and Auditor General - said Mr Raja cost the government nearly 1.76 lakh crores, the CBI believes the value of the scam is 30,000 crores.
The scam centres around whether A Raja as Telecom Minister in 2008 cost the government thousands of crores by choosing to award licences at throwaway prices instead of auctioning second-generation or 2G frequency to companies who were allegedly ineligible.
In a report submitted recently, TRAI said that it had not recommended the auction of spectrum and that the loss caused by Mr Raja's allocation of spectrum cannot be correctly estimated as such a calculation would involve assumptions of future market conditions.
TRAI's stand boosted the case of Mr Raja and others in jail for the scam, and some have referred to it in their defence.
"We are surprised by the TRAI report. TRAI is a Regulatory body created by Parliament. TRAI is supposed to be a regulator. What they have done is debatable," the judges hearing the case said.
While the government's auditor -the Comptroller and Auditor General - said Mr Raja cost the government nearly 1.76 lakh crores, the CBI believes the value of the scam is 30,000 crores.
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