Reddy made Rs 1,439 cr from illegal mining: CBI

Former Karnataka minister and accused in the illegal iron ore mining case in Andhra Pradesh (AP), Gali Janardhana Reddy, earned a profit before tax of Rs 1,439.91 crore from local sales and export of iron ore pertaining to his AP operations during 2007-2010, according the chargesheet filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Obulapuram Mining Company Private Limited (OMCPL), owned by Reddy, had earned a total income of Rs 1,210.90 crore from local sales and Rs 3,099.29 crore from exports between 2007-08 and 2009-10, the investigative agency said in the chargesheet filed before a special court last month.

The above details came to light only after the court acknowledged the chargesheet a couple of days ago as the court authorities had to verify and put a sign on each of the 60,000-odd pages of various documents submitted along with a 164-page chargesheet.

While calculating the overall turnover and profits made by Reddy from his AP operations (iron ore shown as originated from OMC’s AP mines), the CBI also worked out a tax liability on these operations at Rs 521.67 crore, though it was not immediately verifiable as to how much tax was actually paid by OMC and Reddy himself.

The chargesheet said, OMC’s local sales and exports during the period stood at 8.16 million tonnes and 6.65 million tonnes respectively while local purchases made by the company were 1.17 million tonnes. Though the case was centred around the assumption that all the ore either sold locally or exported under the permits issued by the AP authorities to OMC was mined within the geographical area of the state, the CBI in the course of its investigation concluded that almost all of it was in fact brought from Karnataka and elsewhere.

The 68.5 hectare lease, which was granted to OMC by the Y S Rajasekhara Reddy government in 2007 under the most controversial circumstances, was in fact used as a front to route the high grade iron ore sourced from outside the AP borders, according to the chargesheet.

The chargesheet held that OMC director B V Srinivas Reddy, who has been named as accused no. 1 in this case, had created forged certificates to show the deposits in the lease area as high grade iron ore. “The accused no. 1 knows that the quality of ore is not commercially viable. He got created the forged sample analysis reports showing the quality as high grade ore,” it said. The company, in fact, mined just 40,000 tonnes of ‘ore’ in the lease area, according to the investigative agency.

The chargesheet also nailed the role of state government officials, including senior IAS officer Y Srilakshmi, who were actively involved in granting the mining lease to OMC. The note pertaining to the final decision was immediately approved by one and all on the same day, it said.

“Y Srilakshmi had taken undue interest in getting the lease sanctioned in favour of OMC. Right from the order for sanction, issue of the GO to issuance of rejection letters to other applicants were done on the same day (18-6-2007),” the CBI said, stating she had also intentionally avoided incorporating the term ‘captive use’ in the final orders.

The chargesheet also said the officer did not properly brief the Government of India offic-ials on how she found OMC elig-ible for a grant of lease and others not.

Apart from granting mining lease on 68.5 hectare to OMC, the officer also tried to issue another mining lease in 25 hectares, which was originally reserved for the Andhra Pradesh Mining Development Corporation (APMDC). It did not go through because “the minister advised her (Srilakshmi) not to pursue the matter further,” it said.