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Hyderabad, New Delhi, Dec. 23 The World Bank has decided to keep Satyam Computer Services off all businesses for a period of eight years beginning September 2008.

The decision was taken following allegations of data theft in a project handled by the Hyderabad-based software solutions company, Fox News had reported in the morning.

When contacted, a World Bank spokesperson in New Delhi confirmed the report. “It is true. The quotes that the agency used for World Bank are right,” he told Business Line.

But Satyam has refused to make any comment on the development. All that the company said was that it did not want to make any comments on issues related to individual clients. It neither confirmed nor denied the development.

FOX News report said that the Bank did not make the admission in public on barring Satyam Computer.

“Instead, Mr Robert Van Pulley (The World Bank Group’s acting head of information security) made the comments at a meeting and in two telephone conversations with officials of the Government Accountability Project,” it said.

“An anonymous World Bank spokesman conceded to Fox News that Satyam was suspended in February, declared a ‘non-responsive vendor’ and then ‘made ineligible to be a bank corporate vendor’ until 2016,” it said.

It, however, said that currently Satyam’s name was not included in the list of debarred firms on the World Bank’s site.

Quoting sources, Fox News said that the Bank’s investigators had discovered that spy software had been covertly installed on workstations inside the Bank’s Washington headquarters — allegedly by one or more contractors from Satyam.

“The World Bank debarment was meted out for ‘improper benefits to bank staff’ and ‘lack of documentation on invoices,’ the report said, quoting Mr Van Pulley.

Triggered by this and on rumours of Mr B. Ramalinga Raju, Founder-Chairman of Satyam, putting in his papers, the company’s scrip took a beating on the exchanges and fell by 13.55 per cent to close at Rs 140.40 on Bombay Stock Exchange on Tuesday. The scrip opened at Rs 163.

Meanwhile, Satyam Computer has refuted reports of Mr Raju’s resignation, saying “There is no truth (in the rumours)”.

When reports of World Bank snapping ties with Satyam first appeared in October 2008, the company dismissed the reports stating that the story had no validity. A five-year contract between the Bank and Satyam lapsed a month earlier. The contract was to implement ERP (enterprise resource planning) solution, extend document management and integrated messaging system.

More Stories on : Software | Security | Stocks | Satyam Computer Services Ltd

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