Satyam blockbuster: Law of land vs Raju's love of land

LARD LORD: Murky details now emerging point to his love for land that lead to his undoing.

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New Delhi: What caused Satyam's downfall? What lead Ramalinga Raju, once a gentleman, to turn fraud accused of embezzling Rs 7000 crore?

Murky details now emerging point to his love for land that lead to his undoing. His family has brought close to 6,500 acres of land through Maytas Properties ranking them among India's top 10 landlords.

For their real estate empire they needed money and Satyam, many say, was milked for it. Raju was close to ex-CM Chandrababu Naidu, who paraded him to gain global goodwill for Hyderabad.

But once Chandrababu was out, he had to work on the new Reddy government to be accepted on their side.

Today with Raju's wealth allegedly gone and several agencies gunning for him both Reddy and Chandrababu want to keep safe distance and faintly point fingers at each other.

Raju owned Maytas properties and Maytas infrastructure landed several prestigious projects, which include the Hyderabad Metro rail, Machilipatnam port project and airport projects in Andhra Pradesh and Bangalore.

Now there are allegations that not all deals were clean. In several instances as former economic Affairs Secretary EAS Sarma alleges competitive bidding procedures were not followed.

“State government should review all ports and irrigations projects and see if financial data is right. Else they must scrap it,” he says.

Delhi Metro Chief E Sreedharan had even called the Hyderabad Metro Rail project bagged by Maytas a future political scam. He had questioned the allotment of land to the private consortium.

“They have changed the whole network. Some players have gained because of this and transparency has been compromised on,” Sreedharan said.

As the investigations proceed, more skeletons are bound to tumble out. It's now the law of the land versus Raju's love for the land, it could turn out to be a corporate -political blockbuster fraud.