Ramanisblog

Tag: Sun TV Network

  • Maran Had 323 Telephone Lines,Laid cables to SUNTV-Document.

    In his Press meet Dayanidhi Maran stated  that the GM -Telephones had issued him a letter way back that he(Maran) had only one line.

    Funnily, it has been alleged that Maran got these phone lines listed in the name of the chief general manager (CGM) of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), Chennai.http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/story/maran-has-telephone-exchange-at-chennai-home-with-323-lines-cbi/1/140147.html

    He also argued that there has been a systematic campaign to tarnish the image of him,his Family and his Party( DMK) in that order.

    Injured innocence like Raja!

    Raja,his party Minister in the central government is in Jail,his  Great Uncle‘s daughter in Jail(Kanimozhi),his brother’s company MD in Jail,his great Uncle’s legal wife escaped  because of age and illiteracy in English(I hope this is a temporary reprieve for her),his party defends him through third rung leaders like Muthuramalingam, whom no body knows

    What else he has left to be tarnished!

    For Details on Maran’s role in SUN DTH _Aircell read my blog 2G scam trail leads to Maran ,SUNTV DTH.

    Ink in the pen of his lawyer had not dried after issuing legal notice to Tehelka yesterday in connection with the expose on Maxi-SUN DTH-Aircell,he has issued legal notice to new Indian express for this expose.

    At this rate he can have xeroxes of the legal notice ,fill up the names and serve!

    Legal notices served so far are just legal nonsense with no arguments to disprove the expose.

    Best for Tehelka and New Indian Express  is to meet him in court where he has to face cross examination and many more skeletons might come tumbling down.

    A telecom central minister from Tamil Nadu got the BSNL to connect 323 telephone lines to his home, not in Delhi where he had work, but in Chennai where he had none. He got all the 323 home lines listed not in his name but in the name of the Chief General Manager BSNL Chennai. These lines virtually constituted a telephone exchange in the minister’s home. It was exclusively used for his family business by laying 3.4 km long secret cable along public roads to connect the lines to the business premises. This had caused huge loss to BSNL. Who was that enterprising minister? The infamous A Raja? No. It is the famous Dayanidhi Maran; Raja’s predecessor, now the central Textile Minister. The CBI, which probed the fraud, wrote to the Secretary Telecom on 10.9.2007 recommending action against Maran for the fraud….

    Dayanidhi Maran was obviously not playing marbles with 323 telephones. He got the BSNL to lay separate and exclusive underground cable from his Boat Club home to the SUN TV office at Anna Arivalayam in Anna Salai and fraudulently linked the 323 home lines to his brother Kalanidhi’s SUN TV network. The first 23 of the 323 lines bore numbers ‘243722 11’ to ‘24372301’ and the next 300 lines bore numbers ‘24371500’ to ‘24371799’. Since the first four digits ‘2437’ were common for all 323 lines, the lines constituted a home telephone exchange. The Dayanidhi home exchange was operational in the SUN TV establishment for at least months from January 2007 through the fraudulent cable connection from Dayanidhi’s Boat Club home. They were no ordinary telephone lines, but costly ISDN lines, which could carry tons and tons of TV news and programmes faster than satellites to any part of the world. These lines, the CBI says in its report, are “normally used by medium to large commercial enterprises to meet special needs such as video conferencing, transmission of huge volume of digital data of audio and video” – precisely the facility that SUN TV would need for its telecasting operations. For this, the SUN TV would have paid huge cost. But it got it all free, at government’s cost…..

    The Maran home exchange, says the CBI, was “programmed in such a way that no one other than the authorised BSNL staff were aware of the existence of such an Exchange created for his [minister’s] exclusive use”. It added that by linking the minister’s home and SUN TV office by the stealthy cables, “it would appear as if the lines were used in the residence of the former minister, but actually the cables laid facilitated SUN TV network to utilise the services of BSNL provided at his residence”.  Google map shows the distance to SUN TV as 3.4 kms along the main artery roads of the area, which were dug up to bury the illegal underground cables from Maran home to SUN TV office! It was not one of those secret White Collar frauds, but a crime committed in the open roads.

    What could be the probable loss to the exchequer by this fraud? On “a sample study”, the CBI says, “it is learnt that 48,72,027 units of calls have emanated from [just] one Telephone No 24371515 in the month of March 2007 alone, which is indicative of the massive multimedia transfer in the underlying connections”. Just one of the 323 lines accounted for over 48 lakh call units in March 2007 alone – Yes almost 49 lakh call units in one month, through one of the 323 phones! Assume that each of the 323 connections was put to use as efficiently as Marans had operated the Number 24371515; the total number of call units SUN TV would have unlawfully robbed the BSNL during January 2007 to April 2007 [Maran resigned on May 13] could be as high as 629.5 crore call units. With the prevailing rate of 70 paise per call unit could the loss to BSNL be as high as `440 crore? Only a thorough investigation can reveal the true loot. But, the story does not end here. SUN TV’s print cousin ‘Dinakaran’, too has got its share of the loot. Says the CBI: “It is also learnt that similar service connections with ISDN facilities have been provided at the office of Dinakaran, a Tamil Daily, belonging to the group of SUN TV Network at Madurai, though specific phone numbers are not available”. But how did the CBI get to investigate the fraud and where is its report now? It calls for a brief flash back…..

    The CBI had recommended action against Maran as early as in September 2007.

    But the CBI letter is obviously sleeping somewhere since then, and for the last 44 months. The CBI letter had specifically asked the Telecom Secretary to bring the matter “to the notice of” Raja. So the case against Maran of DMK was to be approved by Raja also of DMK….

    http://expressbuzz.com/nation/centre-sat-on-cbi-report-against-dayanidhi-maran/280258.html

  • 2G Scam Leads to SUN TV ,Maran and Aircel.

    Tehelka exposed the shenanigans of Maran and Maran has come out with a defense ‘ there was no loss to the government during his tenure as Union telecom minister, Maran said he was not even a minister when Astroinvested in Sun TV Network. “I own no shares or interest in Sun TV Network,” .

    He is said to have issued notice to Tehelka, which is nothing but legal non sense with no substance and facts.

    Watch.

    Same argument as that of Raja .

    Is Ananda Krishnan a front for Maran?

    Facts seem to speak differently.

    According to sources, the CBI has now trained its guns on a strikingly similar deal — though the quantum is almost four times that of the Balwa-Kalaignar transaction — between Sun TV Group, owned by the family of Union Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran, and Malaysian business conglomerate Maxis Group and owner of 74 percent direct equity in Aircel Group, the country’s seventh biggest telecom operator….

    In November 2006, then Telecom Minister Maran granted 14 (UASL) for Aircel. The licence, along with the startup 2G spectrum, was awarded at the same price at which later Raja gave away 2G licenses to Swan, Unitech and a host of other players in 2008 — Aircel paid Rs 1,399 crore for 14 telecom circles, the price was arrived at through an auction process in 2001 when the telecom industry was in its nascent stage.

    The telecom licences to Aircel were awarded after about two years of ‘unwarranted’ delay on the part of the DoT headed by Maran at the time. Aircel’s applications for new circles were pending since Maran’s takeover as minister for communications and IT in May 2004. According to the report prepared by the one-man committee of Justice (retired) Shivraj Patil constituted to examine the appropriateness of procedures followed by DoT in issuing licences during the period 2001-2009, the DoT kept raising ‘irrelevant’, ‘vague’ and ‘unwarranted’ queries about different aspects related to Aircel and kept the applications pending (Patil submitted his report to present Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal on 31 January)….

    It was only after March 2006, when Malaysian business tycoon T Ananda Krishnan, whose parents were Sri Lankan Tamils, bought 74 percent stake in Aircel, that its file gained momentum. Until then the company was owned by C Sivasankaran, the chairman of Siva Group (earlier known as Sterling Infotech Group). Krishnan paid Rs 3,390.82 crore for 74 percent equity in Aircel. Today, Aircel is the seven biggest telecom operator in the country with its net worth valued in the range of $7.5-$8 billion…

    Six months after Ananda Krishnan’s takeover of Aircel, the ministry granted Aircel the much-vaunted licences in 14 cash-rich circles. This took Aircel from a small regional player to a pan-India operator. If the CAG (Comptroller and Auditor General) valuation of 2G licences is taken as a yardstick, the value of Aircel licences cleared by Maran would amount to approximately Rs 22,000 crore. But Aircel paid just Rs 1,399 crore…

    And in a curious coincidence, in February 2007, four months after the licences were granted to Aircel, Ananda Krishnan through one of his group companies, South Asia Entertainment Holding Ltd (SAEHL) invested $150 million (roughly Rs 600 crore) in a phased manner in Sun Direct TV Pvt Ltd by acquiring 20 percent equity in the company owned and run by Dayanidhi’s brother Kalanidhi and his wife Kaveri Maran. The equity investment was cleared by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs…

    Almost simultaneously, the Maran family was allotted about 12.6 crore additional equity shares in Sun Direct TV to maintain their total equity at 80 percent. But unlike the staggering rate at which the Maxis Group picked up the Sun Direct shares, the allotment to the Marans was made at par value of Rs 10 per share without charging any premium…

    Maran’s Note( confidential)

    Between February 2008 and July 2009, the Maxis Group invested Rs 100 crore more in another Maran family-owned company named South Asia FM Ltd which owns Sun FM radio network. Maxis Group subsidiary South Asia Multimedia Technologies Limited (SAMT) invested Rs 50 crore in equity of South Asia FM Ltd and Rs 43.9 crore in preference shares of SAFL.

    The million-dollar question is, do Maxis- Sun TV and Maxis-Sun FM deals qualify as quid pro quo on similar lines as the Rs 200 crore Balwa-Kalaignar deal? Both the deals materialised soon after the respective telecom companies were granted the UAS licences and with it the precious 2G spectrum. And in both the cases it’s the companies owned by the extended Karunanidhi family that benefited…

    Total Investment Of Maxis In Aircel
    Amount (In Crores) Remarks
    Equity Shares Of Aircel 3,379 For 65% Equity In Aircel
    Equity Shares Of Deccan Digital 11.82 For 9% Stake In Aircel (Through 26% Stake In Deccan)
    Preference Shares Of Aircel 2,846 For 100% Preference Shares Holding In Aircel
    Preference Shares Of Deccan 1,644 For 100% Preference Shares Holding In Deccan
    Total 7,880.82

     

    Sivasankaran Arm-twisted into selling Aircel to malaysia-based Maxis group?
    So was C Sivasankaran, the chairman of Siva Group (erstwhile known as Sterling Infotech Group), a $3 billion conglomerate with interests in realty, telecom, shipping, energy and software, harassed by Maran? Was he pressurised into selling his telecom company, Aircel Ltd, to Malaysian billionaire Ananda Krishnan? Sivasankaran got $800 million for selling his company to Maxis. At the time of the sale, Aircel was operating in only nine circles while its applications for seven circles were lying in limbo. Also, it is reliably known that Aircel wanted to apply for more circles but didn’t do so simply because their old applications were still lying in abeyance. If Aircel was sold after these licences were granted, the company’s net worth would have increased and thus Sivasankaran could have got more money from the sale. Today, Aircel is a pan- India operator, thanks to the 14 licences given by Maran, and is valued in the range of $7.5-$8 billion…

    http://www.tehelka.com/story_main49.asp?filename=Ne040611Coverstory.asp

    Source: Tehelka.

  • Karunanidhi Emperor of Corruption,His Wife/Daughter to be quizzed.Video

    Karunanidhi has amassed wealth beyond wildest imagination for a man who ‘landed in Chennai with a Steel trunk’

    His Family Tree shall make Royal Court Of Arms wince.

    His method of creating benamis is to be seen to be believed.

    -Wife,Companions,Sons,Daughters,Grand sons, Grand daughters,Nephews, Nieces,Sister,sisters son in laws,Son in law,son in laws’s parents.his next in command in the party,party men, Bureaucrats,Drivers, Peons and cooks.

    He has a Trust in his parent’s name which he controls indirectly.

    His kin have been acquiring Educational institutions and Real Estate  on a large-scale.

    He owns Industries indirectly.

    To know more please read my blog filed under ‘Corruption’

    How has he become such a power in Tamil Nadu?

    Separate blog Follows.

    He has a TV Network-Kalaignar TV , from which he withdrew in Public but his wife holds shares.

    His grand sons control the Film industry having production and distribution Houses-Red Giant Movies,Cloud Nine movies-his nephew production House  Sun Movies.

    Sun TV Network is controlled by his sister’s son at the top and Bangalore Operations are controlled by his son in law.

    Story:

    This week, continuing its campaign against out-of-turn allotments of land and property, TEHELKA has an exposé on Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi. The Tamil Nadu Housing Board (TNHB) which commands a large land bank, has a government discretionary quota (GDQ) under which 15 percent of all allotments can be recommended by the CM. Eligibility for allotment under GDQ is as follows: single/deserted women; widows; social workers; physically handicapped persons; defence personnel; ex-servicemen; eminent persons in the field of science, arts, literature, economics, public administration and sports; freedom fighters; government servants with unblemished service records; employees of PSUs, central government undertakings and nationalised banks; PF institutions; journalists; university staff; and employees of local bodies and municipalities.

    While some of these categories sound kosher, most of them raise a fundamental question: why should the government have the power to give coveted land to select employees and journalists over others? The only rationale could be proximity — which is an untenable reason for being the beneficiary of political favours, often worth several crores.

    http://www.tehelka.com/story_main48.asp?filename=Ne111210Coverstory.asp

    PERHAPS THE starkest example of a family member whose phenomenal growth started completely outside democratic space is Azhagiri, Karunanidhi’s second son, now the Union chemicals and fertilisers minister. The 62-year-old contested his first election only in 2009, from the Madurai constituency. What looked like a political debut, however, was only a legitimisation of his iron grip over the southern districts for more than 30 years. In the recently leaked phone taps that exposed the 2G spectrum scam, TN Information Technology Minister Poongothai Aladi Aruna, speaking to telecom lobbyist Niira Radia, referred to Azahagiri as “a cut-throat politician”.

    It all started with a banishment. In the early 1980s, Karunanidhi had sent Azhagiri, then a bank employee, to Madurai, which was his wife Kanthi’s home town. He was to run the Madurai edition of the DMK mouthpieceMurasoli, but was given no say in editorial decisions. He soon lost interest and directed his energies to other profitable ventures. Visibly, Azhagiri now runs a TV channel, a cable service provider (Royal Video), a wedding hall and a huge showroom of silk textiles. But covertly, he also controls the muscle power and moneybags that run the city — the contractors, brokers and land mafia. “Do you know how many stories I’ve written about people who’ve been threatened, harassed or killed after going to the police or court to challenge Azhagiri and his associates?” asks Idaya, a Maduraibased Tamil journalist. “After a point, I realised that there is no point in criticising the king in his own court.”

    As Azhagiri unleashed his kangaroo courts, extortion rackets and henchmen on Madurai, election after election, the city’s largely working class population kept voting CPM candidates to the Lok Sabha, and the AIADMK to the legislature. “Azhagiri used to say that Madurai was being run by the wrong parties,” says TKS Elangovan, senior DMK leader and Rajya Sabha MP. In 1996, when the DMK swept the state, Azhagiri didn’t waste any time. “He used this opportunity to strengthen the DMK cadre in the south,” says Elangovan. When asked to elaborate on Azhagiri’s modus operandi, Elangovan grins broadly. “Hard work and charisma,” he says.

    A long list of Election Commission notices to the Madurai wing of the DMK is less circumspect. It has found Azhagiri’s men guilty of dropping sealed envelopes with Rs. 500 notes in voters’ letter boxes (four notes for four voters) and his cable operators offering six months free usage to subscribers. Cartons of saris were found stored in the house of Azhagiri’s right-hand man, to be distributed at a rally. Weekly biriyani feasts were being held in slums, and women were being given cash coupons or pamphlets that could be exchanged for Rs. 100 at DMK offices. Before every election, goons were making door-to-door visits with sickles hanging down their backs. If anyone dared to protest, their land was confiscated and their vehicles destroyed.

    While his men lashed through Madurai, Azhagiri himself cultivated the manner of a benevolent regional don with the dangerous unpredictability of a Sonny Corleone. Several Madurai-based bureaucrats, all of whom requested anonymity, admitted to having received death threats directly from Azhagiri in his pre-ministerial days. “If I didn’t give the tenders to the men he wanted me to, he would smile softly, look at his henchmen, and leave the room,” says a senior PWD employee. “It was the scariest thing in the world.”

    http://www.tehelka.com/story_main49.asp?filename=Ne260311Coverstory.asp

    After signing a deal to acquire 37.73 percent stake in budget carrier SpiceJet, Sun TV Network promoter Kalanithi Maran on Monday made the mandatory open offer to buy another 20 percent from the public at Rs 57.76 per share. ( Watch )The offer has been made by Kal Airways , promoted by Maran and his wife Kareri, based on the two-week average daily high and low price of SpiceJet equity shares on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), where it is listed, the managers to the issue said.

    Some interesting facts also emerged from the open offer made on Monday:

    – Kalanidhi Maran’s net worth was Rs 13,384 crore ($2.97 billion) as on June 10

    – The new promoters propose to change the name of SpiceJet after acquisition and shift its registered office away from Gurgaon

    – They have, however, undertaken not to sell any substantial asset of the airline

    – SpiceJet was previously called Genius Leasing, M.G. Express, Modiluft and Royal Airways

    – The airline has now been given permission overseas to Bangladesh, the Maldives and Nepal.

    Commenting on the deal, Jagannadham Thunuguntla, equities head at leading brokerage SMC Capitals, said SpiceJet was among few airlines in India and globally which was running profitably.

    “In the future if the government relaxes foreign investment norms for airlines, then SpiceJet can become a target for acquisition for a foreign carrier, netting the promoters a handsome premium,” Thunuguntla told IANS.

    He said apart from the profits, which amounted to Rs 61.44 crore in the year ended March 31, the carrier can also fly abroad. In this regard, the Sun Network brand can capitalise on the large south Indian Indian diaspora in east Asia.

    Maran’s SUN TV Network boasts 20 channels that reach 95 million households in India. It also beams to 27 overseas destinations with large south Indian diaspora including the US, Canada, Europe, Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

    This apart, in its quest to be called a complete media and entertainment company, it runs 45 FM radio stations, two daily newspapers with a circulation of 1.2 million, four magazines and a direct-to-home satellite TV service with 5.5 million subscribers.

    Its cinema arm makes at least eight movies every year, several of them with one of the biggest budgets for Indian films.

  • Maran in 2 G scam?

    Seems to have been a systematic operation by DMK  to swindle.

    Look at their insistence on getting Telecom Ministry earlier.

    For more read my Blogs filed under Corruption/India,Radia Tapes.

    A CBI source told TEHELKA that there is a watertight case against Raja and DB Group MD Shahid Balwa. “We have tracked 2G spectrum money worth Rs. 200 crore, which was transferred from DB Group to DMK’s Kalaignar TV,” said a source. “We are only waiting for a reply to our letter rogatory (LR) sent to Mauritius about a month ago.” This query is about Mauritius- based Delphi Investments, which has stakes in Swan Telecom. The reply will only throw up names of some more beneficiaries in the scam. The puzzle about Unitech’s role is also more or less solved. The CBI will next investigate the allocation of spectrum during Maran’s stint….

    Maran’s tenure was marked by massive growth of Internet subscribers. Also, the share of foreign direct investment in telecom services was raised from 49 percent to 74 percent. In fact, Maran was also credited with massive cuts in mobile and landline call rates. But initial probes indicate that 2G spectrum money worth Rs. 1,000 crore was traded during Maran’s tenure.

    In three years, Maran allocated over 70 GSM spectrum. C Sivasankaran, known for his unorthodox business style, had launched the Aircel brand in Tamil Nadu just four months before Maran took over. He was once a close confidant of Maran’s father Murasoli Maran in the 1990s. But he fell out with Maran when the Tatas aligned with Aircel. It was therefore not surprising that Maran targeted the Tatas and Aircel immediately after he took over as telecom minister. Tata Sky was in direct competition with Sun Network owned by Maran’s brother Kalanidhi.

    Sivansankaran did an excellent job of promoting Aircel in Tamil Nadu. Within a year, he bought his rival RPG Cellular in the state and brought over 2.2 million subscribers into his net. Though Sivasankaran is known for launching new projects, building them up and then selling out, the CBI is intrigued by his sudden exit from Aircel. Almost a year after Maran took over, Sivasankaran sold his stakes to Malaysian company Maxis Communications and Apollo Group of Hospitals owner Dr Pratap C Reddy for Rs. 4,700 crore. Reddy came close to the Maran family in 2000, when Murasoli was cured of a rare type of cardiac condition by Apollo Hospital, Chennai. After Reddy became part-owner of Aircel, the ministry under Maran appeared to become extra generous to Aircel

    Smooth operator C Sivasankaran fell out with the Marans after linking up with the Tatas 

    PHOTO: INDIA TODAY GROUP/GETTY IMAGES

    In 2004, when Tata joined hands with Dishnet Wireless (now Aircel) , Dishnet sought licences under the Unified Access Service regime. The telecom secretary had endorsed the application, but Maran’s office put up a note demanding details that were ‘vague’ and ‘irrelevant’, says the Justice Shivraj Patil Committee report. Its mandate was to look into procedural lapses during 2001-09 in the telecom ministry.

    After Aircel’s owners changed, the report reveals Maran cleared allocation of spectrum for Dishnet in Kolkata within a day. Dishnet has a cellular service in West Bengal, but it didn’t have spectrum. On 4 April 2007, a proposal was put up for allocation. Telecom Secretary DS Mathur cleared the proposal within a day, with a note that the matter had been discussed with Maran. Maxis, which holds 74 percent stake in Aircel, also has a sizeable investment in Sun Network thorough its sister concern Astro. Dr Reddy and his family reportedly control 26 percent in Aircel.

    The Sun TV-Tata Sky spat over channel sharing was well known and Maran had a considerable say in Tata’s cellular and communication plans. Sun TV refused to comply with the Telecom Disputes Settlement Appellate Tribunal’s directive to provide its channels to Tata Sky on an a la carte basis. Sun TV later stalled the process by obtaining a HC stay and thus gained time before the launch of its own DTH venture.

    JUSTICE PATIL’S report has also faulted Maran’s functioning. Recounting procedural lapses, the report says that Maran did not consult the Telecom Commission, the telecom department’s decision-making body, and ignored the Group of Ministers (GOM) while taking crucial policy decisions.

    “Actions during Maran’s tenure fell foul of the procedures laid down in the Government of India (Transactions of Business) Rules, which stipulate that when a policy has any financial bearing, no orders shall be issued without the concurrence of the finance ministry. The minister deviated from ‘extant policy’ by not discussing the issue of determining the entry fee for telecom licence with the finance ministry,’’ the report reads.

    Maran also had his say on the crucial issue of spectrum pricing, which has been a controversial aspect of the 2G scam. He overruled a GOM constituted by the PM and got spectrum pricing removed from its terms of reference, despite strong reservations expressed by the finance ministry.

    http://www.tehelka.com/story_main49.asp?filename=Ne050311IMARAN.asp