New Delhi, May 7 (IBNS): Norway’s Telenor brought new shares and was not sold any existing equity, says Unitech, as the company tries to detach itself from the rest of the firms being probed for helping foreign firms dig into the Indian market at minimal entry fees.
Unitech Wireless, along with Swan Telecom, have raised suspicion within the agencies probing the 2G spectrum scam for joining hands with foreign companies soon after the fresh licenses and spectrum were issued by key accused A Raja’s telecoms ministry.
Purportedly ripping off large profits, Swan Telecom, a telecoms firm floated by Shahid Balwa of DB Realty, sold a 45 percent stake to UAE-based Etisalat for Rs 4,500 crore after biting in into the Indian telecoms industry by paying just Rs 1,537 crore to the government.
Unitech joined hands with the Norway-based Telenor group, but it says no existing shares were offloaded to its partner. Unitech asserts that Telenor invested in new shares to form the joint venture only after it had done “significant work” to establish the telecoms business.
“The Telenor Group has invested Rs 6,135 crore in fresh shares over four rounds of investments, linked to milestones, to hold 67.25 percent stake in the venture,” says Unitech officially.
It adds that the first round of investments from Telenor, to form the joint-venture Uninor, were made in March 2009, 13 months after licenses were issued in February 2008, and the last round was made in February 2010, only after receiving necessary clearances.
But even before entering its partnership with Telenor, Unitech had incurred the “license fee, substantial pre-operating expenses, interest costs and had given the bank guarantee”, it said.
It had “established corporate offices in Noida and project offices in five circles”, filled up the top posts including the that of the CEO, tied up more than 40,000 towers, ordered equipment and implemented IT Services contracts.
Unitech defended the investments by Telenor saying that the additional capital “remains within Uninor which being a serious player in the market, and like other telecoms operators, funded its business operations through a mix of equity and loan”.
The company’s stand comes in symmetry with the legal defence pitched by Unitech managing director Sanjay Chandra’s advocate, veteran lawyer Ram Jethmalani, who this week tried to distance him from other accused in the 2G spectrum scam.
At a bail hearing for the in-custody Chandra in the Delhi High Court on Monday, Jethmalani said that his client’s case was on "on a different footing" from the other accused in the 2G spectrum scam.
A special court of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had earlier rejected interim bail pleas after hearing the applications moved by Chandra, Vinod Goenka of Swan Telecom, and three officials of Reliance - Gautam Doshi, Hari Nair and Surendra Pipara.
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