Prannoy Roy met with Modi twice to try and get out of the pickle he is in

Prannoy Roy gave a speech at the Press Club on Friday evening and thundered, “Never crawl before the power”! In this post we will prove to you what a raging hypocrite he is. He crawled and tried to butter up Prime Minister Narendra Modi not once, but twice to patch-up New Delhi Television Ltd. (NTDV) matters.

Senior staffers in NDTV (who wish to stay anonymous) remember Prannoy Roy gushing praises of Modi, that Modi was so warm and courteous and delighted on NDTV’s plan to popularize Swachh Bharat.

When Modi announced the Swachh Bharat mission in Oct 2014, Prannoy Roy and the top management in NDTV saw it as an opportunity to reach out to Modi. One senior Cabinet Minister was also part of this idea. He fixed a one-on-one meeting with Modi and Prannoy Roy in late 2014. By this time the Enforcement Directorate (ED) was on the way to slap a Rs.2030 crores notice to NDTV for Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) violations.

Delighted over meeting Modi, the next day Prannoy Roy declared in the newsroom on his meeting with the Prime Minister. Senior staffers in NDTV (who wish to stay anonymous) remember Prannoy Roy gushing praises of Modi, that Modi was so warm and courteous and delighted on NDTV’s plan to popularize Swachh Bharat. NDTV managed to even rope in Dettol as a sponsor for Swachh Bharat!

Prannoy even said that Modi showed no signs of being upset over NTDV’s coverage of the Gujarat riots. He further said that the Prime Minister had suggested that the Roys should vacation in the Rann of Kutch. Within weeks Prannoy Roy and Radhika were off to vacation in Rann of Kutch! PM and Prannoy Roy tweeted about NDTV’s Swachh Bharat programme. Meanwhile pressures were mounting on ED not to send FEMA notice by the go-between Cabinet Minister.

After returning from Rann of Kutch Prannoy Roy managed one more one-on-one meeting with Modi through the Cabinet Minister. This was in early 2015. In the meeting Prannoy Roy profusely thanked Modi for suggesting a “wonderful” holiday in the Rann of Kutch.

Showing eminent people selective portions of your battles with the government agencies and smooth talking with them will go only so far.

The following day in the newsroom meeting, Prannoy was so overjoyed on his interactions with Modi that he claimed that Modi is a changed man now and goes by the guidance of the Cabinet Minister.

But Prannoy Roy’s happiness ended when the pliable Revenue Secretary Shaktikanta Das was changed and ED slapped a FEMA Notice for Rs.2030 crores and IT slapped Rs.525 crore Notice for tax violation.