For five years, between 2001 and 2006 -- spanning one NDA and one UPA government -- the Essar Group allegedly tapped several telephones of VVIPs, including Cabinet ministers, corporate chiefs Mukesh Ambani and Anil Ambani and many bureaucrats.

The purported conversations that were thus recorded reveal widespread peddling of influence in corridors of power, corruption in the business milieu, brokering of deals and blurring of lines between business and government.