Parakh alleges CBI tried to impress SC

Former coal secretary P.C. Parakh, booked by the CBI for alleged irregularities in allocation of two Odisha-based coal blocks to Hindalco in 2005, has alleged in his forthcoming book that CBI director Ranjit Sinha had acted against him to “impress” the Supreme Court. The CBI chief has rubbished this charge.

The former coal secretary, in his book, wondered why the CBI chose not to mention Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the conspiracy as he had taken the final decision.

He also made it clear that at no time had the PMO made any recommendation or exerted pressure in favour of any party.

spiracy in handling over the Talabira-II coal block to Hindalco and not registering a case against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was in charge of the coal ministry at that time. The former coal secretary also raised nine questions in the book, among others asking why the PMO’s files were not scrutinised before naming him in the FIR.

He said the CBI was an organisation that did not have any expertise to tackle such cases.

“If the allocation of Talabira-II to Hindalco was undue favo-ur, why were all the 200 coal blocks allocated to private companies not considered undue favour?”. He said the CBI was not equi-pped to find out the truth.

“Its expertise lies in fixing and unfixing people. The CBI is almost totally staffed with police officers who have little or no exposure to policy formulation and implementation,” he added.

The former coal secretary said when he was asked to join the investigation in the preliminary enquiry stage, he had expected the CBI director or an officer one or two ranks below him to interact with him. “Certainly not inspectors of police who do not understand the difference between a coal block and a coal mine.”