Satyam trial: Court pulls up Raju's lawyers

The special court trying the Satyam Computer Services' multi-crore accounting scam case on Thursday pulled up the counsel for B Ramalinga Raju, prime accused, for not submitting an affidavit on whether he can be examined through a questionnaire given by the court.

"The case cannot go on like this for days together. If you don't file your affidavit we will decide the issue as per law.

"The court has already given two adjournments on this," magistrate B V L N Chakravarti said while posting the matter to July 12.

The court had earlier asked Raju's lawyers to file an affidavit on whether the Satyam founder can be examined through a questionnaire.

The court also ordered the CBI to file an affidavit on the status of the pending investigation into the scam which came to light in January last year.

The central agency expressed its inability to file the affidavit at this juncture, saying it was awaiting reply from foreign countries on suspected fund diversion by the accused.

The court, to speed up trial, wanted to know if Raju, who is not attending court proceedings on health grounds, can be examined through a questionnaire.

The disgraced former Satyam chairman is undergoing treatment in Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences here for Hepatitis C since late last year.

Meanwhile, Lakshmi Narayana, DIG, said Letters of Rogatory (a formal request from an Indian to a foreign court for judicial assistance) had been sent to six countries -- USA, UK, Belgium, British Virgin Islands, Mauritius and Singapore.

Of these, four have sent their replies.

"We are yet to get replies from Belgium and British Virgin Islands where we have found large number of transactions took place," the DIG told PTI.

He said unless these governments cooperate with the CBI, the Indian agency can't do anything except put pressure on them through Interpol.