In his arguments, Gupta claimed he had "no dominion" over the natural resource and Singh, who was also holding the portfolio of Coal Ministry at that time, had given final approval for allocation of coal block.
"Accused (Gupta) was only Coal Secretary and heading the screening committee, which was only a recommending body, and thus had no dominion over the natural resources of the country as the final approval was made by the Minister of Coal (Singh)," his counsel B S Mathur told Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar.
However, the CBI countered Gupta's arguments contending that "the Coal Minister/Prime Minister was totally kept in the dark" and alleged that it was the then Coal Secretary who had "misled" the senior officials of the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) -- T K A Nair and Vini Mahajan.
While Nair was the then principal secretary to the Prime Minister, Mahajan was the then director in PMO.
"Gupta misled the PMO officials. He (Gupta) told T K A Nair and Vini Mahajan that everything was done as per merits of the companies," senior public prosecutor V K Sharma said.