Conflict of interests

It is possible, as the Leader of the Opposition LK Advani has charged, that the communications minister’s brother, Kalanithi Maran, asked for a third of the shares in the Tata-Star TV Direct-to-Home (DTH) venture. It is already established that clearances for the DTH venture have been delayed by the younger Maran’s ministry. It is possible that the two sets of issues, even if they happened, are not linked. Certainly, Dayanidhi Maran has sued a newspaper for suggesting impropriety on his part. Curiously, though, the Tatas have not cleared the air by asserting that they have not been put under pressure; all that is forthcoming from Bombay House is “no comment”—which sometimes is a comment in itself. Even without drawing too many conclusions from these straws in the wind, it can safely be said that there is conflict of interests involved in having Dayanidhi Maran at the head the ministry that controls the fate of the industry in which his brother’s firm is such a leading player. Whether the conditional access system (CAS) is to be introduced or not, what rates cable operators are to be paid, whether FM radio firms should be given radio spectrum, whether cable operators will be granted spectrum so as to provide wireless access to subscribers—all of these are decisions that Mr Maran has to take. And all are decisions that affect the profitability of his brother’s venture. It is true that an independent regulator, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, decides on several of these issues, but if the ministry doesn’t approve, they don’t become the law. To take the Tata example, Mr Maran controls the fate of not just the DTH venture through the uplinking permissions which his ministry has to clear, but the fate of most Tata telecom projects. In one case where the Tata-managed VSNL had applied for permission to uplink on behalf of its client Jaya TV, for instance, this was denied by the telecom ministry’s wireless wing and the matter ended up in court. In the case of granting spectrum, which is the life-blood of the mobile phone industry, Ratan Tata has openly come out against the policy being followed by Mr Maran. A group of ministers was set up to debate the issues on how spectrum was to be allocated between users (the points that Mr Tata has brought up were a part of the mandate of the group), but before it came up with its recommendations, Mr Maran announced his policy on spectrum allocation. While that is unfortunate in even the best of circumstances, it becomes unacceptable in a situation of such obvious conflict of interests. So, without meaning any disrespect to Mr Maran, the Prime Minister should consider his options. It is true that the DMK (to which Mr Maran belongs) is a valuable member of the UPA alliance, but surely the Prime Minister is within his rights to decide the portfolio of his ministers, even if he has no choice as to the candidates themselves