churumuri Profile picture
Sep 22, 2021 9 tweets 7 min read Read on X
The amazing rise—and the even more amazing fall—of #Zee founder @subhashchandra, the Haryanvi rice supplier who turned India’s first satellite TV broadcaster into a rabid “fabricator of consent” for the great cause, bit off more than his due, and found himself abandoned. (1/9)
January 2016: Narendra Modi launches @subhashchandra’s candid biography ‘The Z Factor: My Journey As The Wrong Man at the Right Time’ at the PM’s official 7, Race Course Road residence, in the presence of three cabinet ministers: tinyurl.com/96praj3s (2/9)
June 2016: “Independent” candidate @subhashchandra elected to Rajya Sabha with BJP support from Haryana, after 14 Congress votes are rejected. 12 of the Congress votes were declared invalid due to use of “wrong type of ink”. (3/9) tinyurl.com/nce99f74
November 2017: The @IndianExpress reveals through ‘The Paradise Papers’ that through a complex web of transactions, offshore companies of Essel Group, promoted by @subhashchandra, had pledged #Zee shares to raise funds and repay debts. (4/9)
September 2018: In interview with @the_hindu, Subhash Chandra lights into Reliance Industries’ Mukesh Ambani, alleges that the then TRAI chairman Ram Sevak Sharma had got an extension in office because of RIL. (5/9) thehindu.com/business/Indus…
November 2018: November 2018: @timesofindia reports that @subhashchandra was ready to sell up to half his family’s 42% stake to pare debts—and that among the names of potential buyers was Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries. (6/9)
December 2018: Mohit Bhalla reports in the @EconomicTimes that a company called ‘Nityank’ was opposing the merger between the DTH arms of Videocon and Essel groups over pledged shares. The Dhoots and Chandras are related to each other by marriage. (7/9) m.economictimes.com/industry/media…
2019: @thewire_in reports that the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) is probing ‘Nityank’, for the Rs 3,000 crore deposits made just after #Demonetisation. Zee stocks tank by Rs 14,000 crore. @subhashchandra delivers a public apology. (8/9)
October 2020: Once India’s 27th richest man with a net worth of Rs 35,000 crore in 2018, @subhashchandra now claims his personal assets had slumped to under Rs 10 crore. (9/9)

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More from @churumuri

Feb 27, 2023
90 years ago, today—27 February 1933—the German Parliament (Reichstag) was burnt down. Adolf Hitler had been appointed as Chancellor three months earlier; national elections were due in six days. The arson was blamed on communists, but it was an inside job by the Nazis.
A 24-year-old Dutch communist was held responsible and sentenced to death for the #ReichstagFire. But in reality Nazi storm troopers—guided by Joseph Goebbels—had used a tunnel connecting Parliament with the President’s residence to scatter gasoline and self-igniting chemicals.
Hitler’s dictatorship began the day after #ReichstagFire, He got the President to sign a decree for the “Protection of the People and the State”. It dispensed with constitutional protection of all political, personal, and property rights. Opposition was jailed. Media was stifled.
Read 4 tweets
Feb 3, 2023
Jo Johnson, the brother of former UK prime minister @BorisJohnson, has resigned from the board of Elara Capital—a London-based investment firm 99% of whose holdings are Adani stocks.

About time @JoJohnsonUK revealed more on how he ended up at a company linked to Ketan Parekh.
Boris Johnson visited Adani headquarters in April 2022.

Jo Johnson joined Elara in June 2022.

The timing could just be a coincidence. But what kind of background checks did Jo Johnson—a former India correspondent of ‘Financial Times—do before lending his name to the firm?
@FT reports that when Jo Johnson joined Elara last June, the firm intended to tap his expertise on investing in technology and education.

In his statement, Jo Johnson says he hoped to make a contribution to UK-India trade and investment ties.

OK, but…
Read 9 tweets
Aug 24, 2022
🪡 The “hostile” bid by Gautam Adani to take over #NDTV has resulted in shock, sadness, and schadenfreude.

But who offered the channel, the baby of @PrannoyRoyNDTV and his wife Radhika Roy—to Adani behind their backs?

Could it be Mukesh Ambani, who saved it 13 years ago?

Why?
2️⃣ The way @timesofindia puts it, @gautam_adani’s acquisition route was simple.

Adani bought the Roys’ stake in @ndtv by buying up Vishvapradhan Commercial Pvt Ltd (VCPL), from two shareholders: Nextwave Televentures and Eminent Networks, for Rs 114 crore.

This gave him 29%.
3️⃣ VCPL, Nextwave and Eminent share the same 4th floor address in Gurgaon.

The common director in all three companies with the same director identification number (00548276) is a Anil Kumar Jain.

Is he an Ambani man or a front? Jain sits on more than boards.
Read 10 tweets
Aug 23, 2022
“Vishvapradhan”

Does India’s “most gifted businessman” @gautam_adani have a sense of humour? He has acquired 99.5% of the 29% stake of @ndtv founders Prannoy and Radhika Roy through a subsidiary called “Vishvapradhan”. Hopefully not a portmanteau of Vishwaguru and Pradhan Sevak.
Adani Media Networks Ltd CEO @sanjaypugalia is quoted as saying “AMNL seeks to empower Indian citizens, consumers and those interested in India, with information and knowledge” by acquiring #NDTV.

As a media watcher who reads ‘Manufacturing Consent’ every night, do you think?
“This is a baseless rumour. Radhika and Prannoy Roy are not in discussions, nor have been, with any entity for a change in ownership or a divestment of their stake in NDTV”

@ndtv clarification to BSE. So, has Adani made the open offer after a deal with Mukesh Ambani?
Read 4 tweets
Jul 12, 2022
“Uber sought ‘strategic investors’ in foreign media to win government favour’

@JeffBezos-owned ‘Washington Post’ goes where ‘Indian Express’ understandably cannot in its reporting of #UberFiles—7, Lok Kalyan Marg—and the Times Group’s role as navigator.
washingtonpost.com/media/2022/07/…
2️⃣ When Uber was trying to “get Delhi back live” after the Dec 2014 rape ban, an Uber general manager in Asia wrote that “he planned to set up meetings for co-founder Trevor Kalanick “with prime minister @narendramodi and cabinet officials”. @washingtonpost @PMOIndia #UberFiles
3️⃣ Sivakumar Sundaram, the chairman of the executive committee of Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd, denies Times Group facilitated Uber “with any form of political access”.

But the @EconomicTimes editor’s email to Kalanick suggests much.

@washingtonpost @timesofindia #UberFiles
Read 5 tweets
Jul 12, 2022
Times Group actively courted Uber after it was banned; urged its founder Travis Kalanick to present his “insights [to] set the agenda for policy formulation” at ET summit, in Jan 2015. Two months later, Uber invested Rs 150 crore in @TimesInternet.

Read: tinyurl.com/yuvyxbup
“Let’s be sensitive to keeping a strong relationship with TOI… if there’s something we can do for them that makes sense, we should do it”

Travis Kalanick wrote to staff the same day he received Times Group overture. #UberFiles @IndianExpress @RTIExpress techcrunch.com/2015/03/22/ube…
5 Dec 2014: Delhi woman raped by driver in Uber car

18 Dec 2014: Uber chief Travis Kalanick is “guest editor” of TOI

31 Dec 2014: @EconomicTimes editor invites him to ET Summit

23 March 2015: @TimesInternet makes “strategic investment” in Uber

Read: tinyurl.com/mryuw4j8
Read 6 tweets

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