CBI seeks StanChart help to get to bottom of Aircel-Maxis deal

NEW DELHI: The CBI has asked the Standard Chartered Bank, or SCB, to share with it details of the three-way correspondence between it and Maxis Communications , the Malaysia-based company which bought Aircel in March, 2006, and NRI businessman C Sivasankaran. The SCB was, according to the CBI sources, banker to the deal, and the correspondence between it and the other two players, the agency believes, would go a long way in shedding more light on the entire transaction, which is now the subject of its investigation.

The investigating agency, it is learnt, wrote a letter last week to the head of the bank’s Indian operations , seeking its help in getting details of the funding into the deal. The agency, in particular , is keen on enlisting the assistance of a senior official, who was then posted in Mumbai and had supervised the financial transactions involved in the ownership transfer, but has since then relocated to Singapore.

The CBI, according to sources, is likely to meet senior officials of the SCB’s Indian operations early next month to impress upon them the need to share the details of the correspondence between the bank on the one side, and Maxis Communications and Siva, as Sivasankaran is known in the corporate circles, on the other side to facilitate the task of getting to the bottom of the deal. Aircel was promoted by Siva in mid-1990 s, and very soon became the largest mobile player in the Chennai/Tamil Nadu circles.

Siva, in his statement recorded before the CBI under section 161 of the CrPC on June 6, had alleged that he was forced to sell his entire stake in Aircel by Union Textile Minister Dayanidhi Maran, who was then shepherding the telecom ministry, and his brother Kalanithi. Siva ended up pocketing $800 million for selling his stake in Aircel. The amount, he insisted, was at least $500 million less than the price it actually deserved, but said that he had no option but to sell the company to T Ananda Krishnan, the Sri Lanka-born businessman who promoted Maxis Communications.

His applications for UAS licences for 13 new circles, as also for seeking another extension in the deadline for meeting LoI conditions for the Madhya Pradesh circle, had been pending in the telecom ministry, and Maran, Siva alleged, kept in abeyance a decision on these petitions on the pretext of seeking one clarification after another. Maran has vigorously denied these allegations and has said he had no role to play in the Aircel-Maxis transaction.

He has also said he never deliberately withheld Aircel's application for licences and spectrum. The probe agency is now in the process of verifying the allegations leveled by Siva in his statement . As part of this exercise, it is looking into the DoT documents pertaining to the deal. The letter to the SCB is also part of this verification process.

Getting Funding Details

The investing agency wrote a letter last week to the head of the bank’s Indian operations, seeking its help in getting details of the funding into the deal