2G: Ruias face CBI heat; arrests likely

Feb 18, 2011 |

Tags:

Feb. 17: The CBI on Thursday questioned Essar Group CEO, Prashant Ruia, in connection with its probe related to the 2G Spectrum scam. The agency officials questioned Mr Ruia about the alleged links of Essar with Loop Telecom, which got Unified Access Service (UAS) licences for 21 circles in January 2008.

During his questioning, sources said, Mr Ruia was confronted with Loop Telecom officials, including its CEO Sandeep Basu. The agency officials are also in touch with the Union Ministry of Company Affairs to probe the link between Loop Telecom and Essar group, “if any”. The agency will be calling senior officials of other telecom companies for questioning from Friday onwards. The CBI is expected to make significant arrests in a day or two.

The Essar CEO was called amid allegations that Loop Telecom acted as a front company for Essar which has nearly 33 per cent stake in Vodafone-Essar joint venture. According to the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG), Shipping Stop Dot Com (India) Private Limited (later on changed to Loop Telecom Private Limited) submitted its applications for grant of UAS licences for 21 service areas on September 3, 2007, to the DoT.

However, it is learnt that the company changed the main object clauses in its MoA of Article of Association to include the telecom sector for meeting the eligibility criteria, after submission of the application.

“Mr Ruia was asked specific questions about the findings of the CAG”, sources added.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/58136" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-2048e353822cf1cbd245973b7eb60745" value="form-2048e353822cf1cbd245973b7eb60745" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="80609449" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>