Coal Scam: First verdict convicts Jharkhand Ispat, its two directors

New Delhi: The coal blocks allocation scam witnessed the first conviction, with a special court holding Jharkhand Ispat Private Limited (JIPL) and its two Directors guilty of various charges including deceiving and defrauding the government to bag a coal block in the state.

The court convicted JIPL and its directors R S Rungta and R C Rungta for the offence of cheating and criminal conspiracy under the IPC, observing that they had “fraudulently” and with a dishonest intention “deceived” the government in allocating the North Dhadu coal block in Jharkhand to the firm.

In its 132-page judgement, the court held that the “false representation” by the convicts “continued to hold ground even when the file containing recommendation of Screening Committee went to Minister in Charge, Coal, Government of India for final approval and thus it was primarily the Government which was deceived into making allotment of a coal block in favour of M/s JIPL while believing all such representations to be true, which in fact they were not.”

“The intention to defraud on the part of accused persons is writ large on the face of record,” the court said.

It observed that offence of cheating under section 420 of the IPC was made out against the three convicts as their act resulted in “delivery of a valuable security”,that is issuance of allocation letter for allotment of coal block to the firm.

The court observed it was clear that JIPL and the Rungtas knew that their claims about actual land possessed by them or steps taken to acquire any further piece of land besides existing installed capacity of their end-use project and the proposed capacity were “false”.

“By way of their said misrepresentations, the accused persons also induced Screening Committee and thereby Ministry of Coal to part with much higher quantity of coal in their favour than was warranted, if at all allocation of any coal block was to be made,” the court noted.

It said the representations made by them were “per-se false” and it “does not require any far-fetched arguments to conclude that the same were made with a dishonest intention as they wanted to present a better status/stage of their preparedness towards establishing the end use project.”

“The mens rea (criminal intent) on the part of accused persons in making the said false representations right from the stage of submitting their application to Ministry of Steel seeking allotment of a captive coal block and till the issuance of final allocation letter with respect to allotment of a coal block in favour of company M/s JIPL is writ large on the face of record and that too while having complete knowledge that all such representations were false,” it said.

The court observed that the facts and circumstances beside evidence led by CBI and cross-examination of the prosecution witnesses, coupled with defence evidence led by the accused, does not show that there was any failure of justice.

The court dealt with the contentions of the accused that no such members of screening committee, who could have said that on account of misrepresentations they were deceived in parting away with the allocation of coal block in favour of JIPL, were examined during the trial.

It held that person deceived in the case was primarily MoC through the Screening Committee route and due to the false representations made by the accused, the committee “believing them to be true chose to make a recommendation in favour of M/s JIPL”.

“Thereafter, it was on the basis of said recommendation of the Screening Committee that Minister of Coal approved the allocation of North Dhadu coal block in favour of M/s JIPL.

Referring to the minutes of the 27th Screening Committee, the court said it was clear that committee had also placed strong reliance upon the claims made by JIPL at the time of presentation regarding its stage of preparedness with respect to its end use project.

It said that CBI has rested its allegations in the case on misrepresentation by the accused on acquisition of land and installed or projected capacity of its end use project.

The court referred to documents placed before it and said that the accused had consistently changed their stands about the actual land acquired by them.

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Source:zeenews

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