PETALING JAYA: India's Central Bureau of Investigations has applied for warrants of arrest against business tycoon Tan Sri Ananda Krishnan and three others in a money laundering case in New Delhi, The New Indian Express reported.
The report said on Tuesday that the CBI had applied to the special CBI court to issue the arrest warrants against Ananda, Maxis Communication Berhad, Astro All Asia Network and its chief executive Augustus Ralph Marshall.
It said the arrest warrants were over the Aircel-Maxis money laundering case involving former Telecoms Minister Dayanidhi Maran and his brother Kalanithi.
The CBI had explained to the special court judge O.P. Saini that the arrest warrants were sought as summons were not served on the accused.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on May 25, 2016, had issued summons under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to examine Ananda, the report said.
Another summon was issued the next day to examine Marshall and both summons were sent to Malaysia through the Indian Home Ministry.
The Maran brothers had challenged the jurisdiction of the special 2G court, a court set up to try any offence related to the 2G scam, to try the Aircel-Maxis case.
Both Dayanidhi and Kalanithi stated that the said money laundering 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 the 2G scam cases.
Other reports said the 2G spectrum scam was an Indian telecommunications scam and political scandal in which Indian government officials undercharged mobile telephone companies for frequency allocation licences, which they then used to create 2G spectrum subscriptions for cell phones.
It was reported that besides Ananda and Marshall and the two companies, others accused in the case were Sun Direct TV Pvt. Ltd (SDTPL), South Asia Entertainment Holding Ltd (SAFL), the Maran brothers and SAFL managing director Kavery Kalanithi.
The ED had opposed the bail plea in the Maran brothers case citing that the money laundering aspect was still being probed and the possibility of tampering with the evidence and influencing witnesses may not be ruled out.
The court slated the case for further hearing on Aug 27.
In June, the CBI had said that Malaysian authorities had responded to the issue.
The documents sent by Malaysian officials indicated that foreign exchange rules were allegedly violated and tweaked to favour Maxis.
In 2011, the CBI had registered a case against Dayanidhi, Kalanidhi, Marshall and Ananda, besides three companies for alleged graft.
The probe agency claims that quid pro quo on the part of Dayanidhi has been established during the probe.
