SC to hear on Feb 26 pleas seeking review of Rafale verdict
New Delhi, Feb 22: The Supreme Court will hear on February 26 the two petitions seeking review of its December 14 verdict that had dismissed pleas challenging the deal between India and France for procurement of 36 Rafale fighter jets.
The review petition has been filed by former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie as also activist lawyer Prashant Bhushan.
The hearing of the pleas will be conducted in chambers and not in open court.
The trio said the top court had relied upon "patently incorrect" claims made by the government in an unsigned note given in a sealed cover in the court.
Sinha, Shourie and Bhushan have claimed that the judgement was based on "errors apparent on the face of the record" and non-consideration of subsequent information which has come to light would cause a grave miscarriage of justice.
Besides seeking review of the judgement, they have also sought hearing of the plea in an open court.
The top court will also hear the petition filed by AAP's Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh through advocate Dheeraj Singh seeking review of the December 14 verdict.
On December 14, 2018, the apex court had dismissed various pleas challenging the deal between India and France for procurement of 36 Rafale jets saying there was no occasion to "really doubt the decision making process" warranting setting aside of the contract.
It had rejected the pleas seeking lodging of an FIR and the court-monitored probe alleging irregularities in the Rs 58,000 crore deal, in which both the countries have entered into an inter-governmental agreement (IGA).
A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi had dealt with "three broad areas of concern" raised in the petitions the decision making process, pricing and the choice of Indian offset partners (IOP) and said there was no reason for intervention by the court on the "sensitive issue" of purchase of 36 jets.
It had said the Indian Air Force (IAF) needs advanced fighter jets as the country cannot afford to be "unprepared" or "under prepared" in a situation where adversaries have acquired fourth and fifth generation fighter aircraft, "of which, we have none".
The apex court had said Thursday that it would consider hearing pleas seeking review of its December 14 verdict. It had considered the submission of Bhushan that his review plea and a separate application, seeking perjury prosecution of some government officials for "misleading" the court be listed urgently.
"We believe there are four petitions in the matter. One by Union of India... Some petitions (having defects) are lying with the registry," the bench said.
"The combination (of the judges) of bench will have to be changed. It is very difficult. We will do something for it," the bench had said.
The December verdict was delivered by the bench comprising the CJI and Justices S K Kaul and K M Joseph. The two Justices are currently part of different bench combinations.
Bhushan had said the review petition filed by Sanjay Singh was defective and the defect has to be cured and so far as other pleas were concerned, they can be listed for the hearing.
A day after the December verdict, the Centre had moved the apex court seeking correction in the judgement where a reference has been made about the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report and Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC), saying "misinterpretation" of its note has "resulted in a controversy in the public domain".
Sinha, Shourie and Bhushan has also filed a separate plea seeking initiation of perjury proceedings against central government officials for allegedly giving "false or misleading" information in a sealed cover in the case.
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CBI chargesheets 4 Chinese behind Rs 1,000 cr cyber crime racket; 111 shell companies unmasked
New Delhi (PTI): The CBI has filed a chargesheet against 17 people, including four Chinese nationals, and 58 companies for their alleged roles in a transnational cyber fraud network that siphoned off over Rs 1,000 crore through a sprawling web of shell entities and digital scams, officials said on Sunday.
After busting the racket in October, investigators unravelled a single, tightly coordinated syndicate that relied on an elaborate digital and financial infrastructure to run a range of frauds. These included misleading loan applications, fake investment schemes, Ponzi and multi-level marketing models, bogus part-time job offers and fraudulent online gaming platforms.
According to the probe agency's final report, the group layered the flow of illicit funds through 111 shell companies, routing about Rs 1,000 crore via mule accounts. One account received more than Rs 152 crore in a short span.
The shell companies, the CBI said, were incorporated using dummy directors, forged or misleading documents, fake addresses and false statements of business objectives.
"These shell entities were used to open bank accounts and merchant accounts with various payment gateways, enabling rapid layering and diversion of proceeds of crime," a CBI spokesperson said in a statement.
Investigators traced the origins of the scam to 2020, when the country was grappling with the COVID-19 pandemic. The shell companies were allegedly incorporated at the direction of four Chinese handlers -- Zou Yi, Huan Liu, Weijian Liu and Guanhua Wang.
Their Indian associates procured identity documents from unsuspecting individuals, which were then used to establish the network of shell companies and mule accounts to launder proceeds from the scams and obscure the money trail.
The investigation exposed communication links and operational control that, the agency said, nailed the role of Chinese masterminds running the fraud network from abroad.
"Significantly, a UPI ID linked to the bank accounts of two Indian accused was found to be active in a foreign location as late as August 2025, conclusively establishing continued foreign control and real-time operational oversight of the fraud infrastructure from outside India," the CBI statement said.
The probe found that the racketeers employed a highly layered, technology-driven modus operandi, using Google advertisements, bulk SMS campaigns, SIM-box-based messaging systems, cloud infrastructure, fintech platforms and multiple mule bank accounts.
"Each stage of the operation -- from luring victims to collection and movement of funds -- was deliberately structured to conceal the identities of the actual controllers and evade detection by law enforcement agencies," the spokesperson said.
The chargesheet names 17 individuals, including the four Chinese nationals, and 58 companies.
The investigation was launched on the inputs from the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs, which flagged large-scale cheating of citizens through online investment and employment schemes, resulting in the arrest of three individuals in October.
"Though initially appearing as isolated complaints, detailed analysis by CBI revealed striking similarities in applications used, fund-flow patterns, payment gateways and digital footprints, pointing towards a common organised conspiracy," the agency said.
Following the October arrests, the CBI conducted searches at 27 locations across Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and Haryana, seizing digital devices, documents and financial records that were later subjected to detailed forensic examination.
