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The CBI today told the Supreme Court that Union Law Minister Ashwani Kumar, a joint secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office and a joint secretary in the Coal Ministry saw the draft status report on the investigation into Coalgate and suggested several changes.
CBI Director Ranjit Sinha stated in his affidavit that “majority of these changes were done by my officers in order to refine the reports either on their own or in consultation with the Additional Solicitor General and his assisting advocate or by the Law Minister. Besides, a few changes were also done on the suggestion of the Attorney General and officials of the PMO and the Ministry of Coal.”
He named Shatrughna Singh of the PMO and A K Bhalla of the Coal Ministry as those who have contributed to the changes.
The CBI stated that it was difficult now to attribute each change to a particular person with certainty. However, it admitted that “significant changes” were made in the final status report pertaining to preliminary enquiries with regard to allocation of coal blocks in the period between 1993 and 2005 and the period between 2006 and 2009.
“The tentative finding about non-existence of a system regarding allocation of specific points was deleted at the instance of the officials of the PMO and the Ministry of Coal,” the affidavit said.
One of the changes made by the Law Minister was with regard to the scope of the enquiry. The CBI said that “deletion of a sentence about the scope of the enquiry with respect to legality of allocation while the amendments in the law were in progress was done by the Law Minister.”
Another change in the final status report was made by the PMO and Coal Ministry officials, referring to the non-existence of approved guidelines for allocation of coal blocks.
The affidavit will be examined in open court on Wednesday when the bench presided over by Justice R M Lodha will resume hearing in a public interest petition seeking the cancellation of the illegally allocated coal blocks during the NDA and UPA regimes.
The court, accepting the petition moved by Common Cause, has been grilling the government over the allocation of coal blocks and vetting by “political masters”.
At the last hearing, the court asked CBI to reply to its six questions.
The affidavit chronologically narrates the several meetings between the CBI sleuths, government functionaries and law officers. The proceedings have resulted in a spat between former Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval and Attorney General G E Vahanvati, after which Raval resigned from his post. He has blamed Vahanvati for making him a “scapegoat”.
In the CBI version, Raval told the court “without instructions” that the status report had not been shared with anyone and it was meant only for the court. That statement was made to the court on March 12 “on his own”. Since the query posed by the court was “spontaneous” the question of the CBI instructing Raval did not arise, says the CBI.
In response to the court’s demand, the CVs of supervisory officers in the case have been submitted to the court in a sealed cover along with other relevant documents.
Ranjit Sinha tendered “unconditional apology” to the court for “any inadvertent omission or commission” on his part and has assured it that the investigations are being conducted “independently by a team of officers with utmost sincerity and professionalism and would continue with the same zeal and purpose.”
The CBI Director in his affidavit gave details of meetings with various persons, including joint secretaries of PMO and Coal Ministry, the Law Minister and Attorney General G E Vahanvati on sharing of draft probe reports of the coal scam.
The first of such meetings took place in the first week of February in Law Minister's chamber where Vahanvati was also present but CBI did not request for the details, the affidavit said, adding that at that point of time no status report was prepared.
The draft status report relating to preliminary inquiry and regular cases in the coal block allocations were submitted before the CBI Director who approved them between February 28 and March 4, it said.
The draft report was shown to then Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval and his assisting advocate Satyakam to fine tune the same, it said.
Sinha also told the Supreme Court, which would hear the case on May 8, that on March 6, he and CBI official were informed by Raval that the Law Minister wanted to peruse the draft report at 12:30 PM.
Ashwani Kumar perused the draft status report on that day and "also made certain changes", the affidavit said, adding that in the said meeting, Raval was present and later joined by Vahanvati.
As Raval left the meeting early (on March 6), the Law Minister suggested that the draft status report "may be shown to the AG".
In an assertion, contrary to Vahanvati's statement in the court that he did not see the status report, the CBI Director said, "On the same day in the afternoon on receiving a message from Raval, Joint Director Galhotra and DIG Ravikant (of CBI) went to the residential office of the AG.
"I was not present in the said meeting. I was informed that ASG (Raval) was also present there. The AG glanced through portions of the status report of PE 2 and PE 2192012 E 0004 (allocations made during 1993 to 2005)...He also suggested certain minor changes in the status report of PE.
"The AG neither asked nor was given a copy of the final status report that were to be submitted before the court."
Dealing with the third meeting of the day (March 6), Sinha said it was held with Shatrughna Singh and A K Bhalla, joint secretaries of the PMO and the Coal Ministry respectively. The government officials went through the draft report and on the the next day, suggested changes in them.
The draft reports were then compiled again and later approved by the CBI Director, the affidavit said.
