India’s Former Coal Secretary Faces Questions on Coalgate

The Hindu reported that India’s Central Bureau of Investigation questioned H.C. Gupta, the country’s former coal secretary, for over seven hours today regarding “alleged irregularities” in coal block allocations during his time in office.

As quoted in the market news:

Mr. Gupta faced tough questions for allegedly overlooking the misrepresentation of facts by AMR Iron and Steel Private Limited which was allocated Bander Coal block in Maharashtra.

The CBI claimed that AMR had ‘fraudulently and wilfully’ concealed the fact that its group of companies have already been allocated five coal blocks with an “object to avoid scrutiny on this count which would have weakened its claim”, they said.

The allegation against the former Coal Secretary was that the committee did not follow the mandatory procedures and did not carry out proper background checks while allocating coal blocks to the companies.

Click here to read the full report from The Hindu.