There was a flurry of activity after the CAG report on coal block allocation was published. PILs were filed too. The Supreme Court then directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to investigate the allocation of coal blocks from 1993, when the Coal Mines Nationalisation Act was amended to permit captive mining in the private sector. The Supreme Court is monitoring the investigation. Allocations between 1993 and 2003 were made under a policy formulated by the government headed by the Congress party and continued by the following NDA government. In my opinion there is no case for investigation into allocations made from 1993 to 2003.

The CAG has not made adverse observations on these allocations. Nor has anyone else complained against these allocations. No meaningful investigation can be made and responsibility fixed in cases that were decided decades earlier. This would only result in the frittering away of limited CBI resources in terms of manpower and expertise. It can at best amount to a witch-hunt.

The CBI is not equipped to find the truth. Its expertise lies in fixing and unfixing people. Unfortunately, it is doing so even in the Coalgate investigation although the Supreme Court is monitoring it.

The CBI is almost totally staffed with police officers who have little or no exposure to policy formulation and its implementation. The entire investigation is in the hands of officers at the level of inspectors who have little understanding of the decision-making process in the government.

When the CBI called me to Delhi, given the importance of the case and its economic and political ramifications, I expected that either the CBI Director or an officer one or two levels below him would interact with me.

Certainly not inspectors of police who do not understand the difference between a coal block and a coal mine. In the two days I spent with the CBI, I explained in detail the working of the Screening Committee and the responsibilities of a secretary and a minister in decision making under the Business Rules of the Government of India.

The allocation of Talabira II block also figured in these interactions. I explained the rationale of including Hindalco in this block, while modifying the Screening Committee recommendation. Their basic argument was that this change benefited Hindalco.

I said, “Of course it has benefited Hindalco, just as allocation of other blocks has benefited hundreds of other private companies.” It was precisely for this reason that I had proposed open bidding for allocation of coal blocks.

They insisted that this change was because of pressure from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). I categorically stated there was no pressure from the PMO, and that the case was considered entirely on merit. I said I take full responsibility for what I recommended. I thought the CBI had understood the logic of this decision.

I was surprised at the CBI’s naiveté when they registered an FIR in this case and a team of a dozen officers landed at my door to search my flat eight years after I retired. I did not understand what they expected to find in my house.

Neither did they. While I took it in my stride, my wife was shocked and traumatised at this reward for 36 years of honest, sincere and dedicated service.

To my mind the entire approach of the CBI in investigating the coal scam is faulty. The CAG’s report that prompted these investigations underlines the fact that unduly long delay in switching over to a transparent bidding system led to the coal scam.

I had proposed the change in early 2004 and vigorously pursued it until I retired. The CBI has made no effort to elicit the reasons for this abnormal delay. Was this delay deliberate or otherwise? If deliberate, who was responsible for it? Did those responsible for this delay derive any advantage by continuing with the old discretionary system? If an ordinance to protect criminals, by reversing a Supreme Court order, could be processed in less than three months, why did a minor amendment which could have brought transparency and equity in allocation of coal blocks take so long? This is the crux of the matter that the CBI needs to investigate.

But the CBI is not doing that. Instead, it is involved in the meaningless exercise of examining thousands of documents of various ministries of the Central government, State governments and private companies to discover criminality where none may exist. I have no information about the facts of the 16 FIRs it has filed in Coalgate and cannot comment about the CBI’s bonafides in these cases. However, about Talabira II coal block, in which the CBI has registered an FIR against Mr Kumar Mangalam Birla and me, I can say without hesitation that the CBI is either outright incompetent or is playing a deeper game which I do not understand.

What can be more absurd than the CBI questioning the bonafides of Mr Naveen Patnaik, merely because he made a recommendation in favour of Hindalco? If a chief minister is not to canvass for projects he thinks would generate employment and revenue for his State, what is he Chief Minister for?

With this kind of investigation, after wasting thousands of crores of public money, Coalgate may also end in a whimper, like Bofors. The actual culprits responsible for the delay in the introduction of a transparent system, and those who benefited from the delay, could go scot-free…

Talabira II and Talabira III are sub-blocks of a contiguous coal block that has no geographical or geological features warranting its division into two separate mines. This division was unscientific and was done many years ago when coal blocks were identified for allocation to private companies for captive use.

While Talabira III was with the Mahanadi Coal Fields Limited (MCL), a subsidiary of Coal India, Talabira II was identified for captive allocation. Such artificial division of coal blocks leads to loss of sizable quantity of coal at the barriers.

Being a mining geologist myself, after I joined the ministry I directed that in future the boundaries of all coal blocks should be determined only by geological and geographical features. No blocks should be artificially subdivided.

Hindalco and Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC) were strong contenders for Talabira II. Both had equally strong credentials on the basic qualifying criteria of financial and technical competence and a credible downstream project.

Hindalco was the prior applicant and the Government of Odisha strongly supported its case. Since the Ministry of Coal and the CBI have denied me access to relevant records, I do not recall the power ministry’s views.

(With permission from Manas Publications)

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