Three in a day: Audit nightmare for UPA govt
Coal ministry claims calculations are faulty and notional; Aviation ministry says the figure is totally erroneous and misleading; Power minister states the auditor ignored its submissions.
Coal ministry claims calculations are faulty and notional; Aviation ministry says the figure is totally erroneous and misleading; Power minister states the auditor ignored its submissions.
Lack of competitive bidding led to loss
The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India in its report on coal block allocations alleged that government’s failure to introduce competitive bidding process in the allocation had caused financial gains of Rs. 1.86 lakh crore to private coal block allottees.
The CAG report titled —Allocation of Coal Blocks and Augmentation of Coal Production — was tabled in Parliament on Friday. It said a part of this financial gain could have come to the government.
“The process of bringing in transparency and objectivity in the allocation process of coal blocks, which commenced from 28 June 2004 got delayed at various stages and the same is yet to materialise (as on February 2012) even after a lapse of seven years,” report said.
The auditor further rapped the government and said that a part of the lost finances could have accrued to the national exchequer by operationalising the decision taken years earlier to introduce competitive bidding for allocation of coal blocks.
The loss figure of Rs. 1.86 lakh crore was arrived at by the auditor in respect of 57 open cast or mixed coal mines allocated to private parties. The report names 25 companies that were beneficiaries and include the names such as Essar Power, Jindal Steel and Power, Hindalco, Tata Power, DB Power, Adani Power, CESC, Monnet Ispat, Rungta Mines, Mukund and Tata Steel.
Coal minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, however, dismissed the CAG’s reported loss of Rs. 1.86 lakh crore as “notional”.
“Of the 57 coal blocks that has been put under scanner only one coal block has become operational till date. Where is the question of undue financial gain to a private party. The entire loss figure is notional,” the minister clarified.
Jaiswal added the bidding process could not introduced because of opposition from three states that include Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal.