New Delhi: A 1993-batch officer convicted in three coal block allocation cases for not checking whether the companies applying for mining leases had completed their forms, was not with the department checking those applications at the time, official records accessed by ThePrint show.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took up the coal allocation scam probe following an August 2014 Supreme Court ruling declaring all coal block allotments between 1993 and 2010 illegal and arbitrary, apart from those through competitive bidding.
As part of its investigation, the CBI accused three senior bureaucrats of conspiring with the applicant companies to cause monetary losses to the exchequer by not allotting the coal blocks through bidding.
One of them, K.C. Samria, was a deputy secretary-rank officer with the coal ministry in 2006-2007. The CA-I department processed the applications involving the “illegal” coal block allotments before he joined, later forwarding the applications to the power and coal ministries and the governments of states where the coal blocks lay for reviews and inputs. Afterwards, the applications reached the screening committee’s desk.
Records show Samria got the additional charge of the CA-I section on 16 March, 2007. The CA-I section, CBI found, received incomplete applications between 6 November, 2006, and 12 January, 2007, and checked them before Samria’s joining.
Still, the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) approved the CBI request to prosecute Samria in four cases. The agency made its request to the DoPT in compliance with the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, under which a department must sanction the prosecution of a government officer or minister.
Five years later, however, the same DoPT declined the CBI request to prosecute Samria in five other cases on learning that the officer was not posted with the coal ministry’s CA-I when the companies applied for the coal blocks. Meanwhile, the trial court ordered Samria’s trial in one more case, apart from the four cases given sanctions previously.
Five orders since then have declined CBI permission to prosecute Samria, saying the officer was not looking after the checks in the CA-I section. The DoPT reached this conclusion on the advice of the coal ministry, to whom Samria then reported.
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Trial court orders
After considering on-record materials, the coal ministry refused to approve Samria’s trial. So, the trial court could not initiate legal proceedings against him in the five cases despite the CBI chargesheets naming him.
While denying the CBI request, the DoPT ignored the advice of the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC). On perusal of the CBI report and other records, the CVC had agreed with the recommendation to prosecute Samria in all five cases. But, due to the weightage it gave to the findings of the coal ministry, the DoPT did not pay heed to the CVC.
“And whereas, the competent authority (coal ministry), after duly and carefully examining the investigation report of CBI, the comments of the Ministry of Coal, the advice of CVC, and facts and circumstances of the case and no criminal misconduct has been established against Samria,” noted the DoPT orders in all the five cases.
When the coal ministry realised Samria was not the CA-I section officer-in-charge during the irregularities and rejected the CBI request, the trial court had already convicted him in two cases. Those were related to coal blocks allocated to M/s Kamal Sponge Steel and Power Limited (KSSPL) and M/s Vikash Metal and Power Limited (VMPL).
The court pronounced the judgment in the KSSPL case on 19 May, 2017, and the VMPL decision on 30 November, 2018. In both cases, it convicted Samria for not checking the eligibility of the applicant companies. After his counsel relayed to the trial court that Samria was not looking after the department that checked the applications, it said that Samria should have still checked them after taking over his position.
The other case the trial court heard against Samria, without a formal sanction to prosecute the official, is the illegal allocation of coal blocks to M/s JLD. Adjudication on this case is pending. Similarly, a trial against Samria is pending in the M/s Visa Power Limited case. His acquittal has come in only one case involving M/s Navabharat Power Private Limited.
In his appeal before Delhi High Court—filed soon after the two judgments convicted him—Samria defended himself, saying he was not with the CA-I department when the companies applied for consideration for the coal block allotments. Following his appeal, the DoPT also learnt that Samria was not in the CA-I branch during the commission of the alleged crime.
Speaking to ThePrint, Samria’s lawyer, Rahul Tyagi, said, “Prosecution of Samria for alleged omissions of a period when he was not Director CA-1 is another example of the non-application of mind during the investigation and the predetermined decision to prosecute IAS officers of the MoC (Ministry of Coal).”
For Samria’s convictions, he blamed the media hype, saying a calm and forensic examination of facts and applicable laws could not take place initially.
“Now that hype has died, and evidence has come out, Mr Samria no longer faces prosecution on the same facts for which he initially was convicted, as the government (Centre) refused to grant sanction for prosecution against him,” he explained.
“It is so sad that an honest Dalit officer, the youngest of his batch, has suffered like this. Everyone expected him to reach the highest levels of administration at a very young age, but his entire career is now in shambles due to these meaningless and misconceived prosecutions. There can be no compensation or restitution for the injustice caused to him,” Tyagi added.
CBI requests denied
In April 2020, DoPT rejected the CBI’s 11 December, 2018, request to clear Samria’s prosecution in the case involving M/s Vandana Vidhyut Limited, noting that Samria took charge of the CA-I section on 16 March 2007.
“When the applications were received in the section, Samria was not looking after the work of the concerned section,” noted the order. It quoted the decision of the administrative ministry, that is, the coal ministry, to decline the sanction for prosecution.
Despite the fresh stand of the DoPT, the CBI sent another letter on 16 September 2020, seeking permission to initiate a trial against Samria in the case of M/s Prakash Industries Limited getting a mining license even after allegedly violating guidelines. The DoPT refused to entertain the request on 2 July, 2021.
Months later, on 20 October, 2021, DoPT, on due and careful consideration of the facts, declined Samria’s prosecution in the case naming M/s Constisteel. The CBI sent its request for sanction on 10 November, 2020.
The detailed order noted that the advertisement inviting applications for mining lease mentioned that the documents would be checked in the initial stage when Samria was not looking after the CA-I section. It further opined that no documentary evidence on record proved that the completeness of the applications remained unchecked.
The order distinguished between scrutiny and checking of applications. It said the non-scrutiny of applications before formalising the shortlisted applicants did not indicate whether, at the initial stage, the completion and eligibility of the applications went unchecked.
So, the DoPT, in its order, mentioned there was no reason for Samria, after joining CA-I, to check the process supposedly done at the initial stage. Hence, Samria, also absent during the formalisation of the applications, remained unaware of the matter, the DoPT order mentioned.
Four days after the DoPT denied his prosecution, the ministry turned down another CBI request against Samria in the case against M/s Prakash Industries Limited. The rejection order was as detailed as the one issued on 20 October, 2021, in the case of M/s Constisteel.
The CBI, once again, approached the DoPT in June 2023, asking it to let the agency proceed with a criminal trial against Samria, but the DoPT declined on 17 August 2023.
Besides Samria and other ministry officials, M/s RKM Powergem was the company against whom the CBI is probing corruption charges.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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