SC slams Raja for undermining PM's authority

The Supreme Court today pulled up former telecom minister A Raja for undermining the authority of the prime minister, the highest office in the country, and overlooking the advice of the law ministry.

The SC bench comprising justices GS Singhvi and AK Ganguly hearing the petition by the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), accused Raja of "bypassing" and even "overruling" Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's advice to defer the allocation of 2G spectrum by a few days.

Raja's letter to the prime minister also sounded like overuling the prime minister, the apex court observed.

The bench also wanted to know as to why Raja ignored the law ministry's advice to seek the attorney general's advice, terming it "out of context".

The law minister had advised the telecom ministry to refer the matter of spectrum allocation to the empowered group of ministers (EGoM) for seeking legal opinion.

"Mr Raja first received opinion of the law ministry, which he overruled by saying it was out of context, then he received a letter of the prime minister on the same day asking him to wait and let him (the prime minister) know further action Raja had taken. That is also ignored," the court said.