Maran may face charge-sheet, CBI arrest in mid-May

The fire in the 2G spectrum scam refuses to be doused. Last week, Home Minister P Chidambaram was in the dock for his alleged role in the 2G scam. The CBI-designated court, however, gave him a reprieve. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has now fired another salvo saying that it will be ready to chargesheet former Communications Minister Dayanidhi Maran in early May.

If that happens, Maran may be the second former DMK cabinet minister to end up in jail after Andimuthu Raja.

In a submission to the Supreme Court, which is monitoring investigations in the 2G scam, the CBI says that it will wind up its probe against Maran and Aircel by April-end. This means the chargesheet may be filed in the first half of May, 2012.

The importance of a chargesheet being filed in the 2G scam is that the accused are usually arrested after the courts commit the case and summon the accused. Dayanidhi Maran is already listed as the prime accused and he could well be jailed soon after the CBI files the chargesheet. None of the earlier accused in the 2G scam could avoid arrest. Most did not receive bail till charges were framed by the trial court.

Maran faces charges similar to those against Raja – who is said to have favoured Swan Telecom and Unitech Wireless. The money trail linking Swan’s licences allegedly led to Kalaignar TV, owned by Karunanidhi’s wife Dayalu Ammal and daughter, Kanimozhi, for which the latter did time in jail. But the money trail is not that straightforward, as Kanimozhi says there was loan and it was returned.

CBI sources say that Maran’s case is simpler than Raja’s because it is easier to establish a quid pro quo. CBI’s case is that Maran forced C Sivasankaran to sell Aircel to Maxis of Malaysia, and once this happened, the Malaysian Maxis Group invested in Maran’s family company – Sun Direct TV, the direct-to-home arm of the Sun TV group run by his brother Kalanithi.

A major reason for the delay in investigations against Maran is that the CBI has sent Letters Rogatory (LRs, or requests for information) to the Malaysian government on investments made by Maxis Communication in the Maran family’s business in India. Maxis Group company Astro All Asia Networks, which invested in Sun Direct, is part-owned by the Malaysian government.

The allegation is that Maran, when he was Communications Minister before Raja, had awarded spectrum and several telecom licences to Aircel after Maxis bought it. In return, Maran received Rs 550 crore as quid pro quo investment in Sun Direct TV.

The payment was made allegedly by overvaluing Sun Direct’s shares, and the CBI says the gross overvaluation was deliberate and malafide.

Maran had allegedly favoured Maxis Communication by clearing seven spectrum deals. After that, Maxis’ sister concern, Astro, invested Rs 629 crore at the rate of Rs 69.57 per share and bought a 20 percent stakes in Sun Direct.

In contrast, Maran’s brother Kalanithi invested about Rs 79 crore at the rate of Rs 10 a share to buy 80 percent in the company. So calculating the ‘bribe’ amount on a pro rata basis, Astro pumped in an additional Rs 550 crore for favours showered by Maran, the CBI FIR alleges.

CBI feels that Astro may have kept the Malaysian government in the dark about this deal of ‘unequals’. Thus Astro All Asia invested the Malaysian government’s money in the Maran family’s business for receiving favours in the telecom sector, the CBI alleges.

The CBI has already interrogated local senior officers of Aircel. It has also issued summons to Maxis Communications’ owner T Ananda Krishnan, a Sri Lankan Tamil and Malaysia-based business tycoon, and CEO Ralph Marshal, but they have not yet appeared before the CBI for further investigations. As a result, the CBI has sent LRs to the Malaysian government to get information on Maxis Communications’ investments and statements from Ralph Marshal and T Ananda Krishnan.