Lots of Opportunities since the new regime came in. Let’s make lots of
money. If you have the inclination, we
have the crime.
In just the previous post we looked at how Hindustan Times with
its HT Summit splurged on public
money. Most of their major sponsors being big time PSUs and govt companies. Even
the poor man’s work insurance corporation, ESIC,
seems to have found compelling reasons to invest in HT Summit. Part of that
unholy trinity of media I wrote about is CNN-IBN, HT’s media side-kick. It’s
Managing Editor, Rajdeep Sardesai
(RS), often likes to talk about “integrity”.
Look at the samples. In the first tweet from February 2010 he yearns for “news with integrity” and in the second one, from July
2012, he complains about his integrity being questioned. “Those who abuse...” he says. Actually, anything that
questions or ridicules our media celebs is nothing but ‘abuse’. The second tweet
is because he had to apologise for an earlier stupid and tasteless tweet of
his. When Deep Throat said “follow the
money” he damn well knew what he meant. Pursuit of news and stories never
resulted in loss of integrity but pursuit of extraordinary wealth has often led
to loss of integrity. For almost a month my Twitter friend Suresh Nakhua has been asking questions of RS and CNN-IBN; tricky, troublesome questions
which, of course, would amount to ‘abuse’ in the world of RS.
In this post I will just summarise the questions by Suresh Nakhua who
has storified the financial joyride of CNN-IBN and certain group companies in
his post “Few questions for@sardesairajdeep & some unknown facts abt CNNIBN”. In other words Suresh has just tried to follow
the money. Before you look at the maze of companies, here is a company that
became part of Global Broadcast News Ltd (GBN). And it’s splendidly titled ‘SRH
New Holding Private limited’.
Well, well, all the names from the CNN-IBN family are there. Sardesai, Bahl,
Anubha, Chaubeji, Vidya Shankar and, of course, Cacofonix. Don’t read too much
into that because there is nothing wrong there. This is just to share the ‘dramatis
monetis’. All you need to do is follow Suresh’s tweets on that page
sequentially and enlarge the images contained in each. You will find integrity
in each. So here are the questions that remain unanswered:
1. SRH was a loss making company so how did it end up giving loans
worth 19.71 crores? Hmm! One
could say “we are a private company and it’s none of your business”. Yeah, so
you can’t be in the public domain and keep screaming about integrity either.
2. The remuneration of Jt. MD, Sameer Manchanda, exceeds the limits prescribed under the Companies Act. The
explanation is that GOI approval has been sought and if not received the moneys
will be returned. Clever? First commit the offence and then claim the money is
being held in “trust” and if the approval is not received, it will be returned.
Integrity!
3. At March 2006 GBN had a loss of 46.53 crores. It’s a perfect
qualification to receive an “unsecured loan” of 40 crores during the year, isn’t it? We shouldn’t complain
about the loan itself. It should be of interest to all of us who or what entity
gives such loans just in case we anticipate huge losses too. Needless to say,
you need integrity.
4. To run your business you do need some pocket money at times. Who’s
your daddy? Of course, Syndicate Bank.
So you have this bank lending an unsecured loan of 5 crores to tide over festival periods. While the title shows the
amount as ‘secured borrowings’ the statement says ‘NIL’ against security
created. What was it secured with, integrity? Do read the article on Reliance
and ‘Raghav’s Endgame’ squeezed in between.
5. Then Raghav Bahl, the Chairman of TV18 group, has some 7 Income tax cases pending
against him. That’s normal if you’re running a large group of media companies,
nothing to worry. Then in another page that Suresh produces, an IT penalty of
over 1Cr has been reduced to a mere Rs.53461. Nice, isn’t it? Who’s your daddy? Integrity?
6. That’s all. Oh yes, there’s this small thing apart from the IT
cases, there is an ROC case
against Raghav Bahl that is pending. Oh, one more thing. There is this
e-Eighteen.Com and Victor Fernandes
who claim Bahl & Co. illegally diverted their businesses and are demanding
over 3000 crores in compensation. If I read correctly, it claims there was an
undertaking that TV18 would route business distribution through e-Eighteen
which Bahl is accused of breaking. Integrity! Not the kind of program that will
be debated on CNN-IBN or any of its group channels for sure.
There is hardly any doubt that since the arrival of the UPA govt in
2004 there has been a dramatic growth in the fortunes of certain media
companies. People were complaining of the amount of tax-payer money on the
recently executed terrorist Ajmal Kasab.
He’s just one guy. The amount of tax-payer money certain media outlets may be
guzzling without notice is like silent killers; like Cancer or Diabetes. I have
stated earlier that our news media is
the first line of defence for the corrupt. Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal
have been spending a lot of effort on politicians. If they spent half that
effort on media houses I have absolutely no doubts that corruption and
financial misdeeds will start diminishing in every other sphere. And next time Rajdeep Sardesai talks about
integrity I suggest you have a good laugh. At least laughing doesn’t cost
anything.
*The title is from a Pet Shop Boys song.
