New Delhi:
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is investigating the giant coal scam, today questioned entrepreneur Arvind Jayaswal, Director AMR Iron and Steel Private Limited, whose company is co-owned by Congress MP Vijay Darda and his brother, Rajendra, currently the education minister of Maharashtra.
AMR and its directors are among five firms who have been accused by the CBI of lying to the government about crucial information in their application for coal blocks. The Jayaswal family was given ten coal blocks for a maze of companies. Three Jayaswal firms have been listed by the CBI for malpractices.
The case against AMR relates to coal fields it got in 2008 in Bander in Maharashtra. At the time, the Coal Ministry reported directly to the Prime Minister; Santosh Bagrodia was the junior Coal Minister. The CBI says that AMR's directors did not disclose that the company had already been allocated five other coal blocks and that they inflated their financial net worth to qualify for the allocation.
The CBI says that the directors misrepresented facts to make it seem like AMR was not part of the Jayaswal Group.
Mr Darda is also linked to another Jayaswal firm which was chargesheeted by the CBI last week - he was a director along with his brother Rajendra of JLD Yavatmal Energy Limited, which bagged the Fatehpur East Coal Block in Chhattisgarh.
Mr Darda, who is to be questioned soon, has refuted all allegations against him.
The Press Trust of India cites sources in the CBI to claim that though officials in the Coal Ministry were aware that AMR had already been granted coal blocks, they "wilfully" did not complete an enquiry against the company.
The CBI has already said that it plans to question bureaucrats who colluded with companies to help them corner coal blocks illegitimately.
Several Jayaswal companies are in the dock now for misreporting info in their applications, and for failing to develop coal blocks that they were assigned. An inter-ministerial group is examining 58 companies, half of them privately-owned, for failing to hit the milestones laid out in their contracts for the coal fields that they were assigned.
Earlier, in its FIR on JLD Yavatmal Energy Limited, which bagged Fatehpur East Coal Block in Chhattisgarh, CBI had named Mr Darda along with his son Devendra and other former and present directors including Rajendra Darda, Manoj Jayaswal, Anand Jayaswal and Abhishek Jayaswal.