CBI: Dayanidhi Maran a suspect in 2G scam case

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in
its status report to the Supreme Court on
Wednesday on the 2G scam has a pointed
finger at Dayanidhi Maran, now the textiles
minister, for sitting on Aircel's application
for a spectrum license as a consequence of
which it was sold to Malaysian company
Maxis.
The CBI also told an apex court bench of
justice GS Singhvi and justice AK Ganguly
that it needed time till Aug 31 to complete
its investigation in the 2G spectrum scam.
Though the report was presented in a
sealed envelope, the references to Maran
became clear during the reading of its
extracts by senior counsel KK Venugopal,
who appeared for the CBI. Maran held the
telecom portfolio 2004-07.
There are allegations that Maxis
Communication bought 74% stake in Aircel
and the company was later allotted more
circles to operate in.
Maxis Communication, through its
subsidiary Astro, then invested around
Rs.600 crore in Sun DTH belonging to the
Sun TV Network owned by Maran's family, it
has been alleged.
The CBI had April 2 filed its first chargesheet
in the 2G spectrum scam. The chargesheet
was filed in the special court of CBI judge
O.P. Saini.
It named former communications minister A
Raja, former telecom secretary Siddharth
Behura, Swan Telecom promoter Shahid
Usman Balwa, Raja's aide RK Chandolia,
Swan Telecom's Vinod Goenka, Unitech's
Wireless Sanjay Chandra and three
executives of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani
Group -- Gautam Doshi, Hari Nair and
Surendra Pipara.
In its April 25 supplementary chargesheet,
the CBI named DMK chief M Karunanidhi's
daughter Kanimozhi and Kalaignar TV
managing director Sharad Kumar as co-
conspirators after it traced an illegal money
trail of Rs 214 crore in the scam.
The supplementary chargesheet also named
Karim Morani as well as Asif Balwa and
Rajeev Agarwal of Kusegaon Realty.