DMK will emerge stronger after acquittal: Dayanidhi Maran

CHENNAI: In what he believes to be another vindication, former union telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran believes the CBI court acquitting him in the five-year-old illegal telephone exchange case on Wednesday will reverse the decline suffered by the United Progressive Alliance in its first term.

In July 2013, the CBI had chargesheeted Maran, his brother and one of the promoters of the Sun Group Kalanidhi Maran, and others for setting up illegal phone lines at his residence in Chennai for transmission of high-frequency content. The prosecution alleged Maran had facilitated the set-up of 364 highend telecommunication lines at his Gopalapuram residence and 353 cables at his house on Boat Club Road, leading to financial losses to the exchequer.

Speaking to ETabout the course of investigation and the acquittal by the CBI Court on Wednesday, Maran said: “They made mountains out of the molehills but I always believed in the judicial system. I had to resign as a minister and I even lost an election. The charge [loss to exchequer] had started with several thousand crores originally and at last it came down to 1.2 crore or thereabouts. Anyway, this is a big relief.”


Besides the nosedive in Maran’s political career, the DMK was buffeted another time: A Raja, the parliamentarian from Nilgiris who took Maran’s place as telecom minister, had faced the charge of being complicit in a scam of spectrum allocation to telecom operators below market rates.

He was recently acquitted, too. With Maran already cleared of charges in the Aircel-Maxis case, the development on Wednesday further brightens his image.While A Raja’s acquittal was welcomed by top DMK leaders and celebrations on the streets by cadre, reaction to Maran’s coming clean has been muted.