Chennai: In a major relief to former Union telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran, his elder brother Kalanidhi Maran and five others, a special CBI court in Chennai on Wednesday discharged them from the illegal telephone exchange scam.

The verdict comes as a shot in the arm for Marans, who have already been discharged in the Aircel-Maxis case. The court cases had considerably reduced the clout of junior Maran in the DMK and with Wednesday’s verdict, he is expected to make a comeback.

When their discharge petitions came up for hearing before XIV additional special court for CBI cases in the morning, special judge S. Natarajan posted the matter to 2.30 pm for pronouncing verdict on their plea.

Soon after the trial commenced in the afternoon, the judge said the petitions moved by former BSNL general manager K. Brahmnathan and former deputy general manager M. P. Velusamy, were allowed.

Similarly, he allowed the petitions filed by DMK leader Dayanidhi Maran and Kalanidhi Maran, Chief technical officer S. Kannan and electrician K. S. Ravi of Sun TV network and Dayanidhi Maran’s private secretary Gowthaman.

Passing the verdict in less than two minutes, the judge said that there was no prima facie case made out in the charges framed against them.

The CBI alleged that Dayanidhi Maran used 764 telephone links and for which no bills were raised causing a loss of Rs 1.78 crore to BSNL, Chennai and MTNL, Delhi when he was telecom minister. He installed the “illegal” telephone exchange at his residences in Chennai during June 2004 to December 2006.