BJP points to coal allotment 'scam'

After cornering the Congress-led government on the Commonwealth Games (CWG) and 2G spectrum scams, the BJP has raised the issue of the “haphazard” manner in which coal blocks were allotted to around 200 companies in 2006-09, when the coal ministry was under the direct charge of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. HT reports.

After cornering the Congress-led government on the Commonwealth Games (CWG) and 2G spectrum scams, the BJP has raised the issue of the “haphazard” manner in which coal blocks were allotted to around 200 companies in 2006-09, when the coal ministry was under the direct charge of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

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“Coal worth around Rs 53 lakh crore was mined during these three years and the details of this will be revealed in a day or two,” BJP national spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member Parkash Javedkar said, while addressing the national convention on “Corruption and Recovery of Black Money” organised by the chartered accountants cell of the BJP in Amritsar on Tuesday.

Without going into the details of the allotment, he said that the policy framed in 1993 by the Narashima Rao government to allot coal blocks to 'captive players', like steel mill owners was done away with in 2006.

It was then decided to allot blocks on a first-come-first-serve basis, and this was where things went wrong, Javedkar claimed.