NEW DELHI: The three officials who blew former telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran’s cover with regard to allegations by former Aircel chief C Sivasankaran are key in the hierarchy of the Department of Telecom in deciding on the allocation of spectrum, depending on its availability, to new licencees on first-come-first-served basis. The Joint Wireless Advisor (JWA) and the Deputy Director General (DDG) act as ‘record-keepers’ of all applications made by telecom companies for licences for different telecom circles in a date-wise order, along with the corresponding availability of spectrum at the given point of time.All three officials, former telecom secretary Nirpendra Mishra, JSA Ram Jee Singh Kushwaha and DDG P K Mittal have corroborated in their individual written statements to the CBI that when Aircel’s applications had come to the DoT, there was enough spectrum available in the telecom circles in which it had applied. The officials said they had given their recommendations to give spectrum to Aircel, but Maran stalled it by raising ‘frivolous’ queries.Sivasankaran was then forced to sell his telecom venture to Maxis, owned by a friend Maran’s. Within months of Aircel changing hands, all pending licences were cleared. In lieu of the favour extended to Maxis, it invested approximately `750 crore in Sun TV Network and other sister concerns controlled by Maran’s brother Kalanidhi.
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