ED calls Vodafone chief for grilling over 2001-02 allocations

The Enforcement Directorate, an arm of the department of revenue, has summoned the managing director of Vodafone India on 18 April in connection with a money-laundering probe.

Vodafone India is headed by Marten Pieters, though the ED summons does not specifically name him.

The agency has sought a lengthy list of documents from the company as part of its probe into the alleged irregularities and losses in the allocation of airwaves when the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance was in power.

The notice asks the managing director to appear before the ED in New Delhi through authorised representatives with the documents for details of spectrum allotted to the company by the department of telecommunications (DoT) and bank accounts from 1 January 2001 to 31 December 2002, along with details of foreign direct investment (FDI) received by the company and copies of correspondence with the Reserve Bank of India in this regard.

It is believed that the ED summons is related to the probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into allocation of airwaves to telecom companies between 2001 and 2007.

The summons comes a month after finance minister Pranab Mukherjee announced the government's intention to tax Vodafone's $11-billion purchase of Hutchison Essar in 2007, despite the Supreme Court rejecting the income-tax department's demand, by tweaking the tax laws with retrospective effect.

The Supreme Court, which is monitoring the 2G spectrum scam case, had also ordered an investigation into allocation of all airwaves between 2001 and 2007.