Ratan Tata, Chandrasekhar trade charges over 2G scam involvement
A war of words has began between Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata and Rajya Sabha MP and former BPL mobile promoter Rajeev Chandrasekhar as the two shot off accusing open letters and traded charges of involvement in the 2G Spectrum allocation scam.
While Tata maintained that his company has never sought or taken any undue favour from former Telecom minister A Raja or earlier minister, Chandrasekhar accused the Tata Group chairman of dragging the business war into personal front.
Replying to an open letter by Chandrasekhar, Tata in another open letter dated Dec 8 from overseas said: ?TTSL [Tata Teleservices Limited] has not been advantaged in any way by Mr. Raja or any earlier Minister.?
In fact, Tata said, it was Chandrasekhar and others who ?lobbied aggressively? through COAI (Cellular Operators Association of India) to ensure against a ?technologically agnostic? environment.
Tata said Chandrasekhar and industrialist Nusli Wadia had approached him in July 2002 to sign a letter against a technology neutral policy.
Tata said his company should not be lectured by the likes of Chandrasekhar on ethics which the Tatas uphold despite “erosion in the ethical fabric of the country”.
Tata further said: ?Growth could have been far greater had incumbent operators like Mr. Chandrashekar risen above self interest of protecting their investment and allowing the existence of all technologies on an equal footing.
?The same operators continue to subvert policy; have even paid fees for spectrum, even before the announcement of a policy, and have ‘de-facto’ ownership in several new telecom enterprises.?
?TTSL is the only operator that returned spectrum when demanded by DoT (Department of Telecom). The CAG report clearly indicates which of the powerful GSM operators are holding spectrum beyond their entitlement free of cost and to the detriment of the other operators,? Tata added in the open letter.
Hitting out at Chandrasekhar, Tata said, ?Your affiliation to a particular political party is well known and it appears their political aspirations and their endeavour to embarrass the Prime Minister and the ruling party may well have been the motivation behind your letter.?
?We should all note that many of the flip flops in the telecom policy occurred during the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime. Recent policy broke the powerful cartel which had been holding back competition and delaying implementation of policies,? he added.
Tata also sought investigations into Spectrum allocation from 2001.
On Thursday afternoon, Chandrasekhar hit back with another letter in reply to the one by Tata, terming the latter’s contents weak on arguments and promising to fight back with rebuttals, triggering a war of letters.
He said the letter of Ratan Tata was a personal attack on his and not in the spirit of a debate.
?On facts, your letter is not just exceptionally weak, but in fact, refuses to engage on the issues that I had raised – the yawning gap between what you say in public and what your companies do. While those remain unanswered, I will certainly reply shortly with my response. I promise to rebut your allegations, claims and innuendo – chapter and verse in the public domain,” he wrote.
While A Raja had to resign over the Rs 1.76 lakh crore ($ 40billion) 2G spectrum allocation scam and is under the scanner of the CBI, some tapes of conversation between journalists and Tata appointed PR professional Niira Radia hinted at corporate lobbying.
A standoff is continuing between the ruling Congress and the opposition led by BJP over a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into the scam with the former refusing the JPC and the latter sticking to it leading to a deadlock in the Parliament.
Another 2G scam is round the corner. National frequency allocation plan (NFAP) 2000, had clearly earmarked a large chunk of spectrum approximately 30 MHz (1880 -1900 & 1900–1910 MHz) for indigenously developed technologies.
This is diluted in NFAP 2008 where 1900–1910 paired with 1980 – 1990 was also proposed to be considered for Cellular operation but clause for indigenous technologies has been dropped.
Now in 2010 the proposal is to auction 1900–1910 paired with 1980 – 1990 so last chance to develop & commercialise Indain technologies developed on 2G would be lost.
In the past authorities provided spectrum for indigenous technologies & now these aspects are not only being ignored while planning spectrum for newer technologies like 3G but also earlier laid out spectrum for Indian developed technologies are being canabalised for use by MNC products.
This is antithesis of any efforts to promote Indian development.
Vested interests promoted by Telcos are driving the authorities responsible for allocation of spectrum. 10 MHz of 2G spectrum is now being snatched away from potential R&D houses & is being made available for yet another maga scam hence Government does not want a JPC probe.
The way TATA had got into Political Mess with Rajeev Chandrasekhar on 2G, one thing is getting more clear, Indian Resources is Looted in a Systemic Official way and siding with Political Parties to get cover up. JPC on 5000 Nira Radia Tapes could spill more beans than 2G on every Monkey Business operated by the Nexus of Corrupt Politicians, Bureaucrats, Officials, Industrialists etc….because she is the ” KEY FIGURE ” of all ring leaders. Pakistani Politicians are more Honest and Patriotic than Indian Politicians. MAX Corrupted in Pak is known as Mr 10%, but Indian Politicians could go upto 5,000% to 10,000%.