Later prices and a corporate liability ruling

Published 9 October 2026

In December 2013 the Cabinet approved another set of reserve prices: Rs 1,765 crore per MHz pan-India for the 1800 MHz band, equivalent to Rs 8,825 crore for five MHz, and separate per-MHz reserves for 900 MHz spectrum in Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata. The official release gave Rs 360 crore, Rs 328 crore and Rs 125 crore respectively for those metro areas. These were reserve prices for the planned auction, not proceeds already collected and not a retrospective valuation of every licence cancelled in 2012. The government's release described the decision as supporting efficient use and expansion of services. It did not claim to resolve the evidentiary controversy over the CAG's estimates. (PIB, Cabinet reserve price decision, 9 December 2013)

Spectrum usage charges were a further, separate payment. The August 2012 memorandum said successful bidders would pay a percentage of adjusted gross revenue in addition to the auction price, using the then-applicable schedules and rules. In January 2014 the Cabinet approved a five-percent AGR charge for spectrum acquired in the forthcoming 1800/900 MHz auction and a weighted average where operators combined existing and newly auctioned holdings. Operators not acquiring spectrum in that auction would continue on the existing slab rates. The release treated the weighted average as a path toward a flat-rate charge and said the change was expected to improve bidding sentiment. This is direct evidence that the government's allocation design involved both an upfront amount and continuing revenue-linked charges. A bidder could assess the auction price together with the future charging framework, while the exchequer's receipts could arise over different periods. The original controversy likewise involved arguments about entry fees, usage charges and promotional policy. The later official decisions make those categories easier to distinguish without asserting that one payment automatically compensated for another under every historical model. (DoT information memorandum, 27 August 2012; PIB, Cabinet decision on usage charges, 31 January 2014)

Sunil Bharti Mittal v CBI, decided on 9 January 2015, arose from a different prosecution within the broader spectrum inquiry. The judgment described allegations concerning additional spectrum allocated in 2002, subscriber thresholds and an additional revenue-linked charge. It recorded the prosecution's allegation of a cumulative Rs 846.44 crore advantage to beneficiary companies from charging an extra one percent of adjusted gross revenue rather than the asserted existing two-percent norm. That is an allegation in this separate case, not another component to add to the CAG's maximum presumptive loss for the 2008 controversy. The legal question reaching the Supreme Court was the special judge's decision to summon Mittal and Ravi Ruia even though the CBI had not named them in its charge sheet. The judge had reasoned that their controlling position made them the directing mind of their companies. The Supreme Court reviewed that reasoning, not the entire truth of the prosecution's additional-spectrum allegations. Keeping that scope visible prevents a procedural corporate-law ruling from being misrepresented as the final verdict in the main 2G case. (Supreme Court, Sunil Bharti Mittal v CBI, 9 January 2015)

The central error concerned the direction in which criminal intent was attributed. The Court explained that the intent of people who control a company can, in the appropriate circumstances, be attributed to the company. That does not mean that because a company is an accused, its alleged criminality can automatically be attributed back to its chair or managing director. The judgment identified two routes to personal prosecution: sufficient evidence of an individual's active role coupled with criminal intent, or an applicable statutory provision creating the relevant vicarious liability. A corporate title alone supplied neither. This is especially useful in a legal history filled with overlapping companies, subsidiaries and senior executives. A chart of control may explain who managed a business, but it is not itself the proof of the act and intent required for a particular offence. Conversely, the judgment did not give controlling officers general immunity. Evidence of their own role, or a statute that expressly supplies liability, remained capable of supporting prosecution. The decision challenged an automatic shortcut from corporate status to personal responsibility while preserving evidence-based routes to responsibility. (Supreme Court, Sunil Bharti Mittal v CBI, 9 January 2015)

The Mittal judgment separately considered a criminal court's power to summon someone whom the probe agency had not charged. It said the court could do so where the material collected in the inquiry justified prosecution. The agency's omission did not bind the court. But the judge had to apply his mind to sufficient grounds for proceeding against the particular person and record that satisfaction. The Court distinguished taking cognizance of an offence from identifying the offenders against whom process should issue. This gives the ruling more substance than the headline that two businessmen had their summons cancelled. It rejected the reason used, not the court's power to evaluate the evidence independently. The standard at that point was also not a final determination beyond reasonable doubt: it was whether sufficient material justified proceeding. (Supreme Court, Sunil Bharti Mittal v CBI, 9 January 2015)

The operative result allowed Mittal's and Ruia's appeals and set aside the summons against them, while dismissing Telecom Watchdog's connected appeals. The epilogue expressly left open two later paths. The special judge could examine the existing material again and pass an appropriate order if enough incriminating material justified proceeding. If sufficient incriminating evidence emerged during trial, the judge could use Section 319 of the Criminal Procedure Code in accordance with law. The Supreme Court therefore did not close every possible route to bringing the individuals into that case. It required the route to rest on evidence and the correct legal principle rather than a reversed attribution of corporate liability. This qualification belongs with the outcome wherever it is summarised. Alongside the sanction, bail and Chidambaram decisions, the ruling demonstrates how many distinct thresholds operated around the controversy: access to prosecution, detention pending trial, prima facie implication of an additional person and the issuance of process. Those thresholds help explain the legal history, but none can be substituted for the final findings in another proceeding. (Supreme Court, Sunil Bharti Mittal v CBI, 9 January 2015)