Dasari under lens in coalgate

Despite former minister of state for coal and Telugu actor Dasari Narayana Rao claiming innocence in the Rs 1.86 lakh crore coal block allocation scam, his name is being linked to allocation to a private company, Corporate Ispat & Alloys Ltd in Jharkhand in 2005.

 Documents accessed by Express reveal that in August 2004, Jharkhand chief minister Arjun Munda had strongly recommended to then MoS for coal Dasari to allocate the Chitarpur coal block to Corporate Ispat and Alloys Ltd.

 The company had earlier failed to get a favourable decision despite applying number of times but got the block after Munda’s intervention.

 In a letter to Dasari dated August 20, 2004, Munda had written: “We recommend the allotment of Chitarpur coal block to Corporate Ispat Alloy Limited.

 I shall be grateful if you could kindly issue appropriate instructions to the concerned officials of the ministry, in the interest of economic development through larger investment in the mining sector and industrialization of the backward area of the state.

” The ministry had heeded Munda’s request.

  Through a letter dated September 2, 2005, the coal ministry confirmed the allocation with a condition that the production from the captive blocks shall commence within 36 months and it should be used for their own specified sponge iron and power project.

 But even after the allotment, no progress was made by the company to meet the conditions and the mine has remained dysfunctional till date.

 The Chitarpur mine was expected to yield extractable reserves of about 36 million tonnes.

 The delay prompted the coal ministry to issue a letter in March 2008 raising concerns over the slow progress of works.

 Corporate Ispat was named in the Comptroller and Auditor General’s report, which had said that coal blocks allocated since July 2004 lacked transparency and objectivity.

 Corporate Ispat is part of the Jayaswal group headed by Manoj Jayaswal who owns several other companies in the power and mining sectors.

 As per the CAG report, the Jayaswal Group managed to corner eight out of the 57 coal blocks under scanner.

 The allocations figure in the list being examined by the Inter Ministerial Group on coal, which on Thursday recommended de-allocation of 4 coal blocks.

 Dasari Narayan Rao’s office refused to comment on the letter when contacted by Express.

 “He is out of town and he has already made his stand clear that he never influenced any decision regarding coal block allocation,” Rao’s office said.