Tatas move court to block Singur contract release

Tata Motors today moved Calcutta High Court against the State Information Commission to prevent it from releasing “secret” sections of the commercial agreement signed between the company and the West Bengal government to set up the Nano factory at Singur, 40 km from here.

The High Court restrained the Information Commission from releasing the “secret” portion of the document for two weeks.

Tata Motors said in a statement, “On a writ petition moved by Tata Motors Ltd, Justice Dipankar Dutta has stayed further operation of the order of the State Information Commissioner of September 8, 2008, for a period of two weeks”.

A few days ago, the commission and the state government had released the basic part of the contract that had revealed that Tata Motors had received a Rs 200-crore loan at 1 per cent, tax breaks and subsidised land and electricity and had been promised refund of VAT and central sales tax on the car.

The opposition Trinamool Congress (TC) had been alleging for weeks that the “secret” portion of the contract contained a list of further benefits that had been promised by the state government to Tata Motors.

“The Tata action in the Calcutta High Court supports our worst fears,” a TC leader told Business Standard.

“The benefits promised under the portion of the contract already released prove that the state government was subsidising the Rs 1-lakh car to the extent of more than a quarter of its cost,” the leader alleged without substantiating on the calculation system used by the TC.

The commission, working under the Central Information Commission, was set up by the state government with a chairman and member nominated by the chief minister, and with the leader of the opposition also serving on it.

“The information commissioner is a statutory authority under the RTI Act and is a quasi-judicial authority,” said a leading lawyer in Kolkata.