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CBI has registered a case against Hindalco, the country’s leading aluminium producer from the stable of Aditya Birla Group, on charges of indulging in corrupt practices to procure environmental clearances for coal mining in a highly polluted area of Odisha.
The agency has also accused T Chandini, former Director of Union Ministry of Environment and Forests, of favouring Hindalco. He did that as member secretary of the Expert Appraisal Committee ((EAC) by allegedly giving a go ahead for mining in the Talabira-I mine in the critically polluted area of Odisha’s Jharsuguda in violation of ministry guidelines, officials said.
In CBI’s FIR, a Hindalco spokesperson said, “This is an old matter from 2014-15. As many as 100 mines were de-allocated as part of the government’s de-allocation process.
Eight years after registering a preliminary inquiry in 2016, the CBI swung into action. The PE was based on allegations that the Aditya Birla Management Corporation Private Limited (ABMCPL) had allegedly paid “massive bribes” to ministry officials between 2011 and 2013 to getg environmental clearance for coal mining in Talabira.
In 2006, the CBI found out, the Ministry made it mandatory for a company to seek prior environment clearances for new projects, expansion of existing products and any change in the product mix in an existing manufacturing unit. The clearance was given by the regulatory authority based on the recommendation of the EAC, consisting of experts from different disciplines.
CBI’s FIR said the company allegedly violated clearances in 2001 and 2009 by producing coal more than the permitted limit .
Its first environmental clearance was given by the Ministry in 2001 for mining 0.4 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) of coal from the Talabira-I mine, as per the CBI. Another clearance was given in January 2009 for expansion, allowing the increase in mining from 0.4 MTPA to 1.5 MTPA.
Hindalco allegedly mined 3.04 MTPA from 2004-05 to 2007-08 and 2008-09, it said. “This fact became known during the process of consideration by the EAC of which Chandini was the member secretary,” the CBI charged.
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