Satyam trial to be over in July

The trial in the Satyam Computers scam case will be completed in the first week of July.

The trial in the Satyam Computers scam case will be completed in the first week of July. The CBI will wrap up presenting its case after producing 11 of its investigation officers for examination by the designated CBI court. This was disclosed by CBI Special Public Prosecutor K Surendra on Wednesday. Officers of the Crime Branch-CID,who investigated the case before it was transferred to CBI,may also be presented as witnesses. The Supreme Court has set July 31,2011 as the deadline to complete the trial in the case.

To speed up the trial,the CBI has reduced the number of witnesses from 650 to 211 and supporting documents mentioned in the charge sheet to less than half from 3,000,as per a Supreme Court direction.

Surendra said 208 witnesses had already been examined. Unless the defence summons any of the witnesses for cross-examination,the trial will end in the first week of next month itself, Surendra said.

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CBI Joint Director (Hyderabad Zone) V V Lakshmi Narayana said the agency was doing its best to speed up the trial so that it was completed before July 31. In spite of reducing the number of supporting documents to be produced in court,the agency will still have to present the Letters of Rogatory (LR) which are yet to arrive from four countries. The CBI had sent LRs to Mauritius,Singapore,British Virgin Islands,US,Britain and Belgium,suspecting that former Satyam founder B Ramalinga Raju had diverted funds to bank accounts in those countries. While Singapore and Britain have sent replies,four others are yet to respond. Depending on the replies,the agency may file fresh charges against Raju.

The CBI has filed three charge sheets in the case. The main charge sheet,running into 300 pages with 1,532 document and statements of 433 witnesses running into 65,000 pages was filed on April 7,2009. The second one was filed on November 29,2009,and the third one on January 7,2010. The CBI has charged nine persons,including B Ramalinga Raju,his brother B Rama Raju,chief financial officer V Srinivas,with criminal conspiracy,cheating,forgery of valuable security,forgery for cheating,falsification of accounts and causing disappearance of evidence for cheating.

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