CBI director's welcome break, to attend Interpol meet in Geneva

CBI to file more FIRs in coal allocation case, also to continue naming promoters of erring companies

As the controversy around the latest coal FIR naming Kumar Mangalam Birla grows, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) director Ranjit Sinha is all set to fly out to Geneva to attend an Interpol event tomorrow.

CBI has decided to file more FIRs in the coal allocation case and also to continue naming promoters of erring companies. However, for the next two weeks no action is expected in this regard, as the CBI director would be away till October 29.

CBI’s preliminary enquiry between 2006 and 2009 is expected to culminate into more cases against corporate big wigs. So far in all the coal scam FIRs, CBI has named the top most official including Udit Rathi of Rathi Steel and Power, Naveen Jindal, Congress MP and chairman of Jindal Steel and Power, besides Birla.

CBI is expected to submit its status report in the coal block allocation scam to the Supreme Court, which will include the findings of its FIR against Birla at the end of this month. According to legal experts, CBI could take directions from the apex court with respect to further course of action it should take.

It was during the coal scam proceedings, that the SC had raised question of CBI’s independence calling it a “caged parrot.” The matter had led to the resignation of former law minister Ashwani Kumar for allegedly changing CBI’s status report to be submitted to the Supreme Court.

The agency has filed 14 FIRs in the coal block allocation scam till now. Out of these, it has named a public servant in only two cases including former minister of state of coal Dasari Narayan Rao and former coal secretary P C Parakh. The latter was hailed as the whistleblower of the coal scam by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India.