Arvind Gunasekar 
New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation has closed the case registered against NDTV, Prannoy Roy, Radhika Roy and others in 2017 for alleged causing a wilful loss of over Rs 48 crore to ICICI bank.
The central agency has closed the case for “want of evidence”, a source told The Wire.
Acting on a complaint by a private person – one Sanjay Dutt of Quantum Securities – the CBI had initiated its investigation against the Roys and conducted searches at their residential premises in Delhi and Dehradun in May 2017.
At the time, former officers of the premier investigative agency had flagged as unusual and irregular the fact that the CBI had taken cognisance of a private complaint in the matter even though ICICI bank had not filed any complaint of its own.
The CBI raid triggered protests by journalists and the opposition, who saw the raids as an attack on press freedom. At the time, NDTV was considered the only television news channel in India willing to be critical of the Modi government.
The Roys were summoned and questioned in this matter by the CBI as late as 2022 while the Adani Group was moving to acquire the channel.
Interestingly, the loan taken in 2009 by NDTV and the Roys from Vishvapradhan Commercial Pvt Ltd (VCPL) – a Reliance entity at the time which the Adani Group bought in order to acquire the channel – was also part of the CBI investigation. The agency alleged that the VCPL loan was used to foreclose an earlier loan availed by the channel from ICICI bank which resulted in an alleged loss of 48 crore to the bank.
In a strongly worded statement shortly after the CBI’s 2017 action, NDTV accused the agency of “[stepping] up the concerted harassment of NDTV and its promoters based on the same old endless false accusations.”
“NDTV and its promoters will fight tirelessly against this witch-hunt by multiple agencies,’ the channel statement said, adding: “We will not succumb to these attempts to blatantly undermine democracy and free speech in India. We have one message to those who are trying to destroy the institutions of India and everything it stands for: we will fight for our country and overcome these forces.”
The Adani group’s subsequent acquisition of NDTV was seen in India and abroad as a ‘big blow to independent media’.