Delayed action shows government in poor light

Ramalinga Raju, the man who confessed to the largest fraud in Indian corporate history, took nearly two-and-a-half days to turn himself in. It’s an inexplicable delay, one that indicates gross dereliction of duty on the part of all arms of the state.

When a man confesses to a crime as mind-blowing as this, common sense dictates that precautions should be taken to ensure that no evidence is destroyed, and the key actors in the drama are taken into protective custody immediately for interrogation. That meant Raju, his CFO and several key managers who reported to him should have been questioned on Wednesday itself.

Instead, all we heard was excuses for delaying action. No one has filed an FIR against the company, we were told on Thursday (So, why didn’t the police do it themselves?). The centre and state took their own sweet time to get the investigations moving despite all the initial bluster about taking swift action.

Was the delay because Raju had political connections? Touching him so quickly would have meant pointing a finger at powerful politicians in Andhra Pradesh.

In fact, the flurry of action seen on Friday night - the supersession of the Satyam board, the announcement of a Serious Fraud and Investigation Office team to probe the scandal, and investigations by the Andhra Pradesh CID — looks suspiciously like a late reaction to market watchdog Sebi’s planned interrogation of Raju on Saturday evening.

There’s obviously more to it than meets the eye. If Sebi had got its hands on Raju first, the politicians who were worried about their links to him would not have been able to control the fallout. And there’s no doubt that Raju had close links to Andhra politicians - from the previous regime of Chandrababu Naidu to the current one, which has awarded him several lucrative contracts in real estate and infrastructure.  

In Andhra Pradesh, it is no secret that lucrative contracts for real estate and infrastructure come only with lots of strings attached.

Informed sources say the Rajus enjoyed a close rapport with chief minister YS Rajasekhar Reddy (YSR). Maytas, the Rajus’ construction firm, has benefited from several contracts, including various irrigation projects the state government has taken up. Under the YSR regime, the Rajus have also bagged the contract to develop the port at Machilipatnam, and the Rs 12,000 crore Hyderabad Metro.

It was over the Hyderabad Metro concession that E Sreedharan, the iconic chairman of the Delhi Metro, fell out with the Andhra government. Sreedharan predicted that the favours shown to Maytas (excessive land allocation) could only end in a “political scandal.” And that’s exactly where the Satyam affair is headed. The Andhra government threatened to sue Sreedharan over his remarks, but today he is the one who will have the last laugh.

The contract is under a cloud and the YSR ministry is in the dock. In fact, YSR and former chief minister Chandrababu Naidu have entered into a slanging match over who favoured the Rajus more.

If, at least for argument’s sake, one assumes that the Satyam fraud is as much about returning political favours as about the Rajus’ own avarice, it would explain why both the centre and state showed no alacrity in setting the investigations in motion. This is an election year, and a scandal would dent the Congress’ fortunes.

One only hopes that the delay in arresting Raju has not helped the guilty destroy all the evidence that links the Satyam scam to powerful politicians.
(With reports from Anshika Misra and KV Ramana)