Bail orders reserved, dark Diwali for Kanimozhi, six others

The CBI told the Judge O.P. Saini that it had no objection to bail being given to directors of Kusegaon Asif Balwa and Rajeev B. Agarwal, Cineyug Film's Karim Morani and Kalaignar TV's Sharad Kumar.

However, the investigating agency opposed bail for Swan Telecom promoter Shahid Balwa and R.K. Chandolia, who was the secretary of former telecom minister A. Raja, who has also been jailed in the case.

The court reserved its orders on the pleas of all seven. DMK chief and Kanimozhi's father M. Karunanidhi Last week met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi. The DMK was hopeful that she would be out on bail.

"We are hopeful that Kanimozhi will be out on bail today (Monday). Kanimozhi should have got bail earlier... there is lot of politics behind the scene," DMK spokesperson T.K.S. Elangovan told IANS.

"She has been in jail for over five months which is a punishment. She is only an accused in the case and denying bail to accused is wrong... all the accused have the right to get bail," he added.

The 88-year-old former Tamil Nadu chief minister and his wife Rajathi AND grandson Adithya have been in Delhi since Friday.

The court had last week charged the seven with criminal conspiracy among other charges.

The case, entrusted to the premier probe agency and involving award of scarce airwaves to new telecom players in a booming industry in 2007-08, went on to be known commonly as the 2G (second-generation spectrum allocation) case.

Fourteen people, including former telecommunications minister Raja, are accused in the case.