Essar Group’s Chief Executive Officer, Prashant Ruia, was quizzed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) today on the telecom spectrum scam. CBI had also questioned him in February.
Ruia was grilled for around 90 minutes today, on Essar’s connection with Loop Telecom, which had got a Unified Access Service Licence for 21 circles in 2008. CBI is trying to gather evidence to prove that Loop Telecom was ineligible for getting a 2G spectrum licence. Essar was in a joint venture with Vodafone for mobile services in the country, and at the same time had a stake in Loop.
CBI suspects Loop to have been a front for Essar. The agency is probing how the Essar group held more than 10 per cent in Loop Telecom in a convoluted structure. By the Department of Telecom's cross-holding norms, a single company or an individual cannot hold more than 10 per cent equity stake in two different companies in the same circle.
A team of CBI and the Enforcement Directorate is to visit Mauritius and Cyprus by the end of this month to probe this matter. Top Essar executives had met the Indian high commissioner to Mauritius to clarify their position, a CBI official told Business Standard. Soon after, the high commission had provided elaborate details of the meeting to the CBI.
CBI is likely to file its third charge sheet in the scam by May 31. This one could name Loop Telecom and Datacom.
“We continue to cooperate with the investigation as we have done in the past. Essar has always been in compliance with all the regulations and laws of the land,” said a company spokesperson.
