Ex-MP Vijay Darda, son get 4 yrs’ jail in coal case

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 50 lakh on JLD Yavatmal Energy Pvt Ltd, which was allotted the coal block. It imposed a fine of Rs 15 lakh each on the Dardas and Jayaswal. The other three convicts were directed to pay a fine of Rs 20,000 each.

“The present case relates to allocation of a coal block. The convicts had obtained the said block by committing cheating with the Government of India. Prosecution is justified in saying that the loss to the nation was huge,” the judge said.

On July 13, the court had held them guilty under IPC Sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 420 (cheating), and relevant provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The CBI had sought the maximum punishment of seven years, claiming that Darda and his son had met the then CBI director Ranjit Sinha at his residence to scuttle the investigation.

The Supreme Court had constituted an SIT to investigate the allegations against Sinha of trying to influence the probe in the coal scam cases. Sinha, a 1974-batch IPS officer, died from Covid-related complications in 2021.

The court had on November 20, 2014 refused to accept a closure report submitted by the CBI in the case and directed the agency to investigate it afresh, stating that the former MP had “misrepresented” facts in letters written to the then Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, who held the coal portfolio.

The court said Vijay Darda, chairperson of the Lokmat Group, had done so to secure the Fatehpur (East) coal block in Chhattisgarh for JLD Yavatmal Energy Pvt Ltd. The court said the offence of cheating was committed by private parties in furtherance of a conspiracy hatched between them and public servants.

The CBI had alleged in its FIR that JLD Yavatmal had wrongfully concealed previous allocation of four coal blocks to its group companies in 1999-2005, but the agency later filed a closure report, saying no undue benefit was extended to JLD Yavatmal by the coal ministry in allocation of coal blocks.

The case had rocked the Manmohan Singh government in 2012 after the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) panned the government for inefficient allocation of 194 coal blocks to public sector enterprises and private companies between 2004 and 2009 for captive use in a non-transparent way.

The CAG said instead of allocating the valuable natural resource, the government should have gone for competitive bidding. Many politicians were alleged to have lobbied for private entities and helped them secure these blocks. Several entities got more blocks for mining than they needed and sold the excess coal in the open market, resulting in huge windfall.

The CAG initially estimated a loss of Rs 10.6 lakh crore to the exchequer, but its final report tabled in Parliament put the figure at Rs 1.86 lakh crore. with PTI