The high-voltage corporate drama between the Maran brothers has drawn its curtain. Sun TV Network Limited has told stock exchanges that a bruising legal tussle within its promoter family is over, with all notices pulled back and grievances apparently buried.
According to the broadcaster, the withdrawal of these notices is “unconditional and irrevocable,” and—just as the company had insisted all along—entirely detached from its daily business or operational affairs.
The now-defunct dispute began when Lok Sabha MP and former Union Minister Dayanidhi Maran accused his elder brother, Sun Group Chairman Kalanithi Maran, of orchestrating a two-decade-old shareholding coup. His legal notice alleged that since 2003, there had been clandestine share allotments, undervalued transfers, creative record-keeping, and strategic dividend manoeuvres—moves that, he claimed, tipped the scales of control firmly in Kalanithi’s favour.
The most striking allegation was that in September 2003, Kalanithi secured 12 lakh shares—worth, according to Dayanidhi, more than ₹3,000 each—at just ₹10 a piece, acquiring a 60% stake. Dayanidhi also charged that family-held shares were shuffled through questionable channels and that company resources were tapped to buy out key stakeholders, including political allies’ families, enriching a close circle of associates.
His demands were sweeping: roll back shareholding to pre-2003 levels, return dividends, undo alleged gains, and brace for action under a battery of corporate, criminal, and anti-money-laundering laws—along with petitions to regulators and even licence cancellations.
Now, without the clang of a courtroom gavel, the saga has quietly ended. Sun TV says the “personal” nature of the spat means the settlement leaves its governance and operations untouched—though for the market and media world, it closes one of the more sensational chapters in India’s family-business chronicles.
