BSNL WiMax scam-The Pioneer 26 2 12

Almost three years after The Pioneer broke the story on the BSNL WiMax scam — under jailed Telecom Minister A Raja — and has since been pursuing it zealously, the CBI on Saturday registered the first FIR and followed it up by conducting raids and interrogating officials and persons concerned.  The Pioneer had first reported the scam in March 2009.
The CBI, acting upon CVC’s direction, conducted  raids at nine premises, including those of top BSNL officials. The Delhi and Chennai offices of Raja’s benami company, backed by a Malaysian tycoon Datto Vijayakumar, were also raided.
According to sources, CBI interrogated top BSNL officials including former CMD Kuldeep Goyal for colluding with Raja in allotting WiMax franchisee to his friendly company Wellcom Communications of Malaysia. The agency has, however, not yet named Raja in the FIR. CBI has pegged the estimated loss due to the irregularities at Rs 535.50 crore. Searches were being conducted in Delhi, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Gurgaon, Chennai and Kolkata.
For its part, the Enforc-ement Directorate has issued Letters of Rogatory against Vijayakumar in connection with Raja’s illegal amassment of wealth. WiMax is a high-speed internet service and is faster than 4G. After accomplishing the illegal allocation of 2G spectrum licences, Raja had decided to start WiMax services in BSNL and issued directions to allow private parties to operate it though the public sector telecom giant had its own huge infrastructure to run the services.
He first allotted franchisee to Wellcom Communications’ India subsidiary, wherein he had a 15 percent stake, through his associate Silvarajoo. After The Pioneer’s expose, Raja changed his plan.
During May 2009, BSNL was forced to allot franchisee to a five shell companies formed on a single date. These five companies are owned by Raja’s another associate Sanjay Kapoor and his relatives.
When this attempt was also exposed by this newspaper, the PMO intervened and floated new rules. According to the new rules, the bidders were to have an annual turnover of at least Rs100 crore. But Raja allotted the WiMax franchisee to a defunct company Ampoules and Auto Limited from Kolkata.
BSNL officials were forced to accept the inflated and manipulated balance sheets of this company. After getting the contract, this company changed its name to Starnet Communications and was taken over by Wellcom Communications, a Malaysian conglomerate which is owned by Vijayakumar, a Malaysian citizen of Tamil origin.