IMPORTANT POINT
Sections 220 and 223 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 only enable the court to hold joint trial of two or more cases. These provisions do not oblige the court to do so.

JUDGMENT

R.F. Nariman, J.

1. Leave granted in SLP (Crl.) No.2978 of 2014.

2. These matters arise as a sequel to the judgment delivered by this Court on 1.7.2013 by which three writ petitions filed by Essar Teleholdings Limited, Loop Telecom Limited and Vikash Saraf were dismissed by a Division Bench of this Court.

3. The brief facts necessary to appreciate how the controversy arose before this Court are as follows.

4. CBI registered an FIR RC No.DAI 2009 A 0045 dated 21.10.2009 alleging offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and criminal conspiracy in respect of the grant of 122 UAS licenses in the year 2008 against various unknown Government officials, persons and companies. The gist of the offence was set out in the penultimate paragraph of the said FIR, which is set out as follows:

“Thus, the concerned officials of Department of Telecommunications in criminal conspiracy with private persons/companies by abusing their official position granted Unified Access Service Licenses to a few selected companies at nominal rate by rejecting the applications of others without any valid reason thereby causing wrongful loss to the Government of India and a corresponding wrongful loss to private persons/companies estimated to be more than Rs.22,000 Crores.

The aforesaid facts disclose commission of offence under sections 120-B IPC, r/w section 13(2) r/w 13 (1) (d) of PC Act, 1988 against certain unknown officials of Department of Telecommunications, Government of India, unknown private persons/companies and others”

5. On 16.12.2010, this Court passed an order reported in Centre for Public Interest Litigation v. Union of India, (2011) 1 SCC 560, directing the CBI to investigate the said FIR. On 10.2.2011, while monitoring the CBI investigation, this Court passed an order directing that no other Court shall pass any order which may in any manner impede the investigation being carried out by the CBI and Directorate of Enforcement. On 2.4.2011, and 25.4.2011, CBI filed a chargesheet and a first supplementary chargesheet against 12 accused persons for offences committed both under the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act. It is common ground that none of the petitioners before us were named or mentioned in these two chargesheets.

6. The present case arises out of a second supplementary chargesheet dated 12.12.2011 naming 8 persons as accused, alleging offences under Section 120B read with Section 420 IPC. It is relevant to mention that this second supplementary chargesheet which implicated the petitioners before us did not contain any offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act. The CBI mentioned in the said chargesheet that separate offences came to their notice during the investigation of FIR RC No.DAI 2009 A 0045, as a result of which the second supplementary chargesheet was being filed. They further went on to state that these charges are triable by a Magistrate of the First Class but may be endorsed to any appropriate court as deemed fit after which process may be issued to the accused persons for their appearance and to face trial as per law.

7. On 21.12.2011, the Special Judge took cognizance of this second supplementary chargesheet dated 12.12.2011 and stated that he was satisfied that there is enough incriminating material on record to proceed against the accused persons.

8. Meanwhile, pursuant to an observation made in this Court’s order dated 10.2.2011, two important things happened. First, the Delhi High Court passed an administrative order dated 15.3.2011 appointing Shri O.P. Saini as Special Judge to undertake trial of cases in relation to all matters pertaining to the 2G Scam, and the Government of NCT of Delhi also promulgated a notification dated 28.3.2011 under the Prevention of Corruption Act nominating the self-same Shri O.P. Saini a Special Judge to undertake trial of cases in relation to all matters pertaining to the 2G Scam. Three writ petitions were filed as has been stated above, cha