He said, PILs should not be used to settle personal scores. He was referring to a petition filed by an NGO in Supreme Court against him alleging favour to Reliance Telecom services by imposing less penalty amount.
Sibal however looked rattled while facing volley of questions from the media at a press conference.
Prashant Bhushan in his PIL had alleged that Sibal had caused a loss of Rs 645 crore to the public excheque by favouring reliance by reducing the penalty to merely Rs 5 crore.
He alleged that the PIL had been filed to settle personal scores. When asked to explain what he meant by it Sibal said that everyone knows about the motive behind filing the PIL. “It takes years to build a reputation and it takes no time to demolish and malign it”, he argued.
“It is learnt that The Centre for Public Interest Litigation, an NGO, has filed an application alleging that minister of Communications has deducted the penalty against Reliance Communications Limited for violation in UASL Agreement to about Rs 5 crore from Rs 650 crore for all 13”, he said in a written statement.
He termed the proceedings initiated by way of an affidavit in the Supreme Court in the 2G case are malicious, motivated and undemocratic. “Malious, because decisions taken pursuant to contractual provisions under the USO Fund have noting to do with 2G. It is defamatory since it attributes dishonesty in decision making,” Sibal said.
He wondered why no substantive PIL is filed and affidavit is filed in the pending 2G proceedings is something that needs a response and hopefully in investigation.
“Universal Services Obligation Fund(USOF)served show cause notice on December 21,2010 to RCL to explain within 15 days why action should not be taken to impose “lump-sum” Financial Penalty of up to Rs 50 crore and debar M/s RCL from future participation in USOF tenders,” he said.
Sibal said that as a minister he was entitled to review the decision taken by his sub-ordinates. The file reached him on February 18 and by that time the company had restored the connections.