Or an unhappy truce?

Sucheta Dalal

Kokilaben Ambani organised the perfect, Bollywood-style, ‘family reunion’ to inaugurate the museum at Dhirubhai Ambani’s hometown of Chorwad. But the camaraderie between the warring sons and glamorous bahus doesn’t seem to have extended much beyond the staged photo opportunities for the media. Reliable sources tell us that Anil Ambani called on Ratan Tata to seek his personal support in drawing the prime minister’s attention to problems plaguing the power sector. This is significant because the Tatas and the Anil Ambani-controlled Reliance group have been bitter rivals in power and telecom and are involved in nasty litigation over their power distribution business in Mumbai. On the other hand, Niira Radia’s influence on Ratan Tata and Mukesh Ambani had brought the two tycoons together at the height of the bruising war between the Ambani siblings. Clearly, things are different after Niira Radia’s exit. We learn that the younger Ambani indicated that all wasn’t quite well, despite the fond mother Kokilaben’s claim that “Dono ke beech pyaar hai. Hum sab saath saath hain”—there is a lot of love between both (the brothers). We are all together.

We also learn that Ratan Tata thawed enough to accept Anil Ambani’s request to be part of the delegation that met the prime minister in January. Mr Ambani, who has large outstanding debts and serious issues in telecom as well, had patched together a telecom delegation to lobby the government. The 2G judgement, of course, has undone much of the diplomatic gains of those meetings.