The Delhi High Court today reserved its order on a plea of ByCell Telecommunications India Private Ltd challenging the order of single judge upholding the decision of the Centre to withdraw security clearance granted to it for GSM mobile services in India.

ByCell is a joint venture company of Switzerland-based ByCell Holding AG and Bitcorp Private Limited, an Indian company has challenged the order of single bench. A division bench headed by Acting Chief Justice A K Sikri reserved the order after hearing the matter with the Centre saying that the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) decision was based on MHA opinion pertaining to security clearance.

 Earlier, a bench of Justice S Muralidhar had said the High Court was satisfied that there was material available with the government to justify the withdrawal of the security clearance by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) granted earlier to ByCell. "ByCell may have satisfied other requirements of the policy concerning FDI and grant of UASL but the security angle was a crucial factor.

The lack of security clearance in the instant case was a valid ground for withdrawal of the FIPB approval earlier granted," Justice Muralidhar had said. ByCell had approached single judge challenging the decision taken by the Foreign Investment Promotion Board revoking an approval granted to it to undertake GSM-based cellular telephone services all over India.