'Radia lobbied to get Raja telecom ministry'🔗

Ashish Khetan

New Delhi

May 5, 2010

UPDATED: May 6, 2010 10:04 IST

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Union Communications Minister A. Raja has been caught on tape lobbying with a corporate PR agent for a place in the Manmohan Singh cabinet during the second term of the UPA.

Headlines Today is in exclusive possession of taped conversations between Raja and powerful corporate lobbyist Nira Radia just days before the swearing-in of the cabinet.

The conversations, which were recorded by investigators for the income tax department, raise serious issues about ministerial propriety.

The income tax sleuths had sought permission to tap the telephone of Radia, who was being investigated by the CBI and the income tax department in the telecom spectrum scam.

Radia is one of India's most influential power-brokers and has the biggest corporates of India as clients.

These conversations were recorded over 300 days, starting from August 20, 2008. Raja was lobbying hard to become the next telecom minister and was being helped in this endeavour by Radia.

Here are excerpts from a conversation recorded on May 24, 2009 at 11.05 am.

Raja: My name is cleared? Radia: Yeah, your case was cleared last night itself. No, what is

[7-https://www.indiatoday.in/top-stories/story/radia-lobbied-to-get-raja-telecom-ministry-73515-2010-05-05]

In November 2010, OPEN magazine[8] carried a story which reported transcripts of some of the telephone conversations of Nira Radia with senior journalists, many of whom have denied the allegations. The Central Bureau of Investigation has announced that they have 5,851 recordings of phone conversations by Radia, some of which outline Radia's attempts to broker deals in relation to the 2G spectrum sale.[9] The tapes appear to demonstrate how Radia attempted to use some media persons to influence the government decisions.[10]

| 20 November 2010: Open Magazine - Some Telephone Conversations | | :--- | | The transcripts that follow are from Niira Radia's conversations with highly influential people. Going by the evidence of the phone taps, these include journalists Vir Sanghvi and Barkha Dutt, and Ranjan Bhattacharya (foster son-in-law of former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee), who seem to have played out the roles of mediators between the Congress and Radia, who was in turn speaking to Raja and Kanimozhi. According to these tapes, Vir Sanghvi seems to have relied heavily on his discussions with Radia to write his column on the gas judgment. The transcripts that appear here do not suggest any direct role for the person Radia is in conversation with, rather they reflect the power and the ability she commands to influence events. | | VIR SANGHVI in conversation with NIIRA RADIA | | "What kind of story do you want? Because this will go as Counterpoint, so it will be like most-most read, but it can't seem too slanted, yet it is an ideal opportunity to get all the points across" | | BARKHA DUTT in conversation with NIIRA RADIA | | "Oh God. So now what? What should I tell them? Tell me what should I tell them?" | | NIIRA RADIA works the phones | | 'He (Raja) told me he said he needs help in the media. So I promised him I'll help him. I'm helping him Ratan wherever I can but the thing is that every time you try and help him, he goes and makes stupid statements, you know. | | A RAJA in conversation with NIIRA RADIA | | "Hmm ...tell Sunil Mittal, you have to work along with Raja for another five years" | | KANIMOZHI in conversation with NIIRA RADIA | | "Yes, yes. That I know. I'm just saying be careful, because he's trying to get somebody from the Congress (to) say things against Raja to dad" |

[8]-http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/india/some-telephone-conversations]

23 November 2010: DNA - Leaked tapes: CBI says it has 5,851 recordings

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