‘NDA govt blocked Satyam probe in ’01’

The Congress has alleged that the BJP-led NDA government had stopped an income tax probe that had in 2001 had revealed that the owners of the Satyam group were manipulating share prices through benami accounts in Hyderabad.

The Congress has alleged that the BJP-led NDA government had stopped an income tax probe that had in 2001 had revealed that the owners of the Satyam group were manipulating share prices through benami accounts in Hyderabad.

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The party dismissed the allegation that the Y.S. Rajashekhara Reddy government had patronized the group in Andhra Pradesh as “baseless and unsound”. It pointed out that BJP-ruled Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh and BJD-ruled Orissa have also given major contracts to Satyam and its subsidiary companies.

Defending the AP government that had arrested Satyam’s founder and former chairman Ramalinga Raju, Moily said: “The law will take its own course… No one will obstruct the investigations.”

Congress spokesman Veerappa Moily on Tuesday urged the Opposition not to “politicise the issue”. But he himself alleged that if the NDA regime had taken proper steps “a lot of things could have been averted.”

“If there is any loss (to shareholders) the NDA and TDP’s Chandrababu Naidu, who was chief minister at that time, should share the blame,’’ he said.

In 2003, an MP wrote to the SEBI to investigate the matter. The issue was also raised in Parliament, but there was no action.

Asked why the UPA did not go into the case, Moily claimed that, according to his information, there was no complaint filed against the company with the government.