New Delhi, Feb 26 (IANS): A case has been registered against former senior BSNL officials and a private company for illegal award of leased service area (LSA) contract for deployment of wi-max services in six telecom circles, the Central Bureau of Investigation said Saturday.

Among those named in the complaint are then BSNL CMD Kuldeep Goyal, then BSNL director (consumer mobility) R.K. Aggarwal, then GM (corporate office) Pradeep Nagpal, and then DGM (strategic planning) Anil Kumar. Kolkata-based Starnet Communications directors Rajesh Bhatt and S. Manoharan have also been charged.

"It is alleged that the public servants had entered into a criminal conspiracy among themselves", said a CBI statement, adding that the accused abused their official position and facilitated the award of franchise for three LSAs to a private limited company by dishonestly and intentionally withholding the sale of tender documents in a fraudulent manner.

"They allegedly diluted the eligibility conditions to accommodate the said private company and thus causing an estimated wrongful loss of approximately Rs.535.5 crore to BSNL," the statement added.

The CBI said the said company did not have the required qualification of Rs.100 crore annual turnover for the previous two years.

Searches are being conducted at nine places in Delhi, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Gurgaon, Chennai and Kolkata. During searches, incriminating documents have been recovered, the CBI said.

Investigations are in progress.