Fiction and fact

The Kejriwal crowd-sourcing investigative technique has caused rumours to spread so thick and fast that incorrect facts often get free play. Last week, the controversy over the Robert Vadra-DLF deals sent market analysts into a tizzy for almost a whole day. It had nothing to do with the Congress Party President’s son-in-law, though. The rumour doing the rounds was that a major deal in which DLF sold some NTC (National Textile Corporation) mill land it held in Mumbai to the Lodha group in August this year, had been cancelled. Since the sale was part of DLF’s strategy to sell non-core assets to cut its Rs 22,680-crore debt, a cancellation had major implications for the realtor’s financial health. Later, of course, it turned out that the real news was the cancellation of a deal between Vadra and DLF involving a 3.5-acre plot in Haryana.