The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed the petition of a journalist seeking a CBI probe on the alleged funding of  Jet Airways, owned by Naresh Goyal, by underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.

No further order
A Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan said no further order was required as the petitioner could not provide additional documents to suffice his allegations.

Senior Counsel Shanti Bhushan appearing for M Furqan, an editor of a Urdu daily, submitted that the investigating agencies did not probe the matter despite a Joint Director of the Intelligence Bureau (IB) writing a letter to the Union Home Ministry about the alleged link of Mr Goyal with Pakistan-based Dawood and Chota Shakeel.

Letter
“The letter written in 2001 says that the black money and extortion money of Dawood and Shakeel had been invested in Jet Airways, which needs a probe,” said Mr Bhushan, a former Union law minister.

‘Come clean’
Seeking direction for a proper CBI probe by producing a letter written by former Union Civil Aviation minister Sharad Yadav, Mr Bhushan said, “It is the duty of the government to come clean.”

Senior Advocate Harish Salve appearing for Jet Airways defended the largest private airline and said that Mr Goyal had been given a clean chit by the Mumbai Police after a thorough investigation between 2004-06.
Security clearance for the operation of international flights to the US from India by the Indian and US authorities were accorded after thorough security check, he said.

ASG Gopal Subramaniam appearing for the government said, “The letter existed in 2001 but we do not have anything as of today.”

 “The report had been filed before the Bombay high court,”he added.

The Bombay High Court had dismissed the petition after the Union Home Ministry and intelligence agencies, including RAW, gave clean chit to Mr Goyal on the question of alleged funding by the underworld don.

The petition said the airline might be used for anti-national and anti-social activities if the illegal funding to it continued.