‘Irregularities’ in KG Basin gas pricing: Delhi court accepts closure report in case against UPA ministers, RIL chief

“On a perusal of the closure report and the material on record, there is nothing which discloses criminality so as to attract any offence under the PC Act, 1988 or under the IPC. Arbitration is stated to be pending in respect of some issues and there may be other civil liabilities but the material on record does not disclose the ingredients of any offence,” the court said.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had ordered the ACB to register the FIR in 2014, prompted by a complaint his office received from former Cabinet Secretary of India T S R Subramanian, former Expenditure Secretary E A S Sarma, retired Admiral R H Tahiliani and advocate Kamini Jaiswal.

It was alleged that there was a “conspiracy to defraud the exchequer and people of India and it resulted in bestowing benefits to RIL by the central government, especially by certain named ministers and officers of the central government and abuse of official position”.

The KG-D6 block with a contract area of 7,645 sq km was awarded to a consortium of RIL and NIKO Resources Ltd.

It was alleged that the “single biggest act of corruption done by the UPA government was the decision to double gas price from $4.2/ British thermal unit (mmbtu) to $8.4/mmbtu… whereas the cost of production of gas was much less and it would make the gas price in India one of the highest in the world, affecting millions and leading to abnormal inflation”.

The FIR had alleged that “impact of the gas price would cost the country a minimum of Rs 54,500 crore every year”.

As per the closure report, there was “no allegation in the complaint and thus in the FIR of any favour or violation of any rules/ guidelines in the tender process for awarding/allotment of exploration block KG/DWN 3 or KG/D-6 measuring 7,645 sq km off the coast of Andhra Pradesh in the Bay of Bengal”.

The report stated that during investigation “no evidence had been found of any criminality in the issue of gas pricing and there was nothing to bring the matter within the ambit of PC Act and the issues regarding the violation of PSC would be subject matter of arbitration”.

Furthermore, the complainant, Jaiswal had also not objected to the closure report, submitting to the court that “many years had passed”.