A German businessman with KGB and Vladimir Putin links has turned out to be a partner in the major Indian Rs2,800-crore electric buses deal with the controversial Indian-Canadian businessman Sri Ram Tumuluri.<\/p>\n
He has been in news linked with several scandals, the Tricity Daily publication reported. <\/p>\n
Investigation in Tricity reveals that Sri Ram Tumuluri\u2019s German national partner Thomas-Christan Seitz is known for close ties with Kremlin and has worked for the interests of Russia\u2019s feared spy agency KGB – now called Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR).
\nTwo years ago, Ram Tumuluri\u2019s England & Wales registered Causis Group Ltd won a tender for supplying The Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) with 1,400 electric vehicles. Causis, registered in the UK but without any operations, is wholly owned by Tumuluri. Its operating entity is India-registered Causis E-Mobility Pvt Ltd. While on paper it is owned by its directors Marudur Subramanyam Chandrasekar and Ravi Kumar Panga, Causis E-Mobility is in reality controlled by Tumuluri.
\nRevelations that Causis Group Ltd has links with the Russian intelligence and Kremlin are alarming. According to a forensic study by the publication, Causis acquired a 100% stake of German-registered Eurabus GmbH in September 2021.<\/p>\n
Eurabus was founded and formerly owned by Thomas-Christan Seitz. Eurabus have previously claimed to be in the process of opening EV factories in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and possibly Tanzania. <\/p>\n
Causis Group Ltd was incorporated in England and Wales on 11 June 2021 under company number 13452464 and the company is 100% owned by Jersey-incorporated New Horizons Investments Limited, which in is turn 100% owned by Tumuluri, papers show. <\/p>\n
Causis Group\u2019s statutory Directors are Tumuluri, Peter Knez, Charles Paul Rowan, Thomas-Christian Seitz and Gary Anthony Dugan.
\nExamination of original German corporate filings reveals that Eurabus GmbH was registered on 02 July 2015 under company number HRB 168446B. Eurabus GmbH\u2019s initial share capital was \u20ac25,000 and was 100% owned by Euracom Group GmbH, a company managed and controlled by Seitz. On 31 October 2019, Eurabus GmbH increased its share capital to \u20ac1.105 million. On 30 September 2021 Causis Group Ltd acquired 100% stake in Eurabus GmbH from Euracom Group GmbH. <\/p>\n
Seitz, currently registered as resident in an upper class former East Berlin area, grew up in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) and attended the infamous Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO), where 50% of the graduates are alleged to have gone into the Soviet diplomatic service and 50% into the KGB, said the publication.
\nA journalist who knew of Seitz and wrote a story about him and his activities in 2008 noted that Seitz graduated from the MGIMO in 1992. The journalist\u2019s article, entitled \u201cThe Russians are Coming\u201d in the daily newspaper Die Welt, described Seitz as associated with two Russian \u201csecurity foundations\u201d closely linked with Vladimir Putin.
\nIn the article, Seitz is described as \u201cVice President\u201d of the \u201cSecurity Academy Waldm\u00fcnchen\u201d in Bavaria that was a branch of the \u201cAcademy for Legal Order, Security, and Defense Matters\u201d in Moscow. The Academy was founded by Vladimir Putin himself. Putin is described as \u201cMember No. 1\u201d. Under cover of an academic organization, official events were reportedly organised for gathering intelligence in politics and business.
\nThe article also states that Seitz and the academy were closely connected to an organisation called the \u201cInternational Counterterrorism Association,\u201d also in Moscow. That organisation in Germany, the article notes, can be connected to Karlshorst, Berlin where the KGB had its headquarters.
\nSeitz states on his LinkedIn profile that he has been Managing Director of Eurabus since October 1992. However, German corporate records revealed Eurabus was incorporated only in 2015. Seitz would appear to be referring to Euracom GmbH and the Euracom Group of companies that was founded in 1994 as far as can be determined from corporate records.
\nAccording to a recently published biography entitled \u201cUnbreakable \u2013 An Extraordinary Life between East and West\u201d, by Dr. Werner Resch, a business partner of Seitz\u2019s beginning in the early 1990s after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Seitz was \u201cvery big in business with armoured cars in the former Soviet Union\u201d.
\nFurther research reveals several corporate entities in Germany, the UK and the Czech Republic associated with Seitz, most of them related to producing and selling luxury armoured cars and minibuses.
\nCausis\u2019 operating entity in India Causis E-Mobility Pvt Ltd was incorporated on 04 June 2021 in New Delhi under company number U34102DL2021PTC381936. Its statutory Directors and Shareholders are Marudur Subramanyam Chandrasekar and Ravi Kumar Panga.
\nPrior to joining Causis as its Director & CEO in May 2020, Panga was a senior executive at Ashok Leyland, an Indian multinational automotive manufacturer.
\nPanga is in business with British national James Fitzgerald O’Keefe, a former contact of Tumuluri\u2019s. According to Panga\u2019s LinkedIn page, he was CEO of EGV Transport India Private Limited, an Indian manufacturing company, in May 2020 for one month. EGV is registered to the same business address as Causis E-Mobility. EGV is 100% owned by UK- registered dormant company EGV Transport Corporation Limited, which in turn is 75% owned by James Fitzgerald O’Keefe. O’Keefe and Panga are statutory Directors of EGV. Marudur has been Head of Business Development at Causis E-Mobility since June 2021.
\nIn October 2021, Causis E-Mobility signed a strategic MoU with state investment promotion agency Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation with a view to establish an electrical vehicles plant in Talegaon. In February 2022, Causis reportedly signed a similar MoU with the Andhra Pradesh government.
\nRecently a US paper reported quoting Indian sources that Ram Tumuluri\u2019s $8 billion India electric buses deal is in huge trouble as he has failed to implement the Rs2,800-crore electric buses deal with the Mumbai authorities, Indian govt sources told a US publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A German businessman with KGB and Vladimir Putin links has turned out to be a partner in the major Indian Rs2,800-crore electric buses deal with the controversial Indian-Canadian businessman Sri Ram Tumuluri. He has been in news linked with several scandals, the Tricity Daily publication reported. Investigation in Tricity reveals that Sri Ram Tumuluri\u2019s German […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341210,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-341209","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n