Court frames charges against Domco, others in coal scam

A court here on Monday framed charges against a Ranchi-based company Domco Private Limited and five individuals accused in a coal block allocation case.

Special Judge Bharat Parashar framed charges against Domco (earlier known Domco Smokeless Fuels Pvt. Ltd.) and its directors -- Binay Prakash, Vasant Diwakar Manjrekar and Parmananda Mondal -- and chartered accountants Manoj Kumar Gupta and Sanjay Khandelwal on February 13.

The court in January observed that prima facie, charges for the offences under section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and section 420 (cheating) of Indian Penal Code (IPC) are made out against Domco Pvt. Ltd., Binay Parkash, Manjrekar, Mondal, Gupta and Khandelwal.

The court, however, discharged Shukdeo Parsad, observing that the charge for none of the offence is even prima facie made out against him.

The court was hearing a case pertaining to alleged irregularities in allocation of Lalgarh (North) Coal Block in West Bokaro Coal Fields in Jharkhand in favour of Domco.

In the chargesheet, the Central Bureau of Investigation said during the course of investigation it was found that Domco Smokeless Fuels Pvt. Ltd (later on came to be known as Domco Pvt. Ltd.) has misrepresented on a number of counts both to steel and coal ministries.

It was also found that a criminal conspiracy was hatched by Domco and its directors with various other people so as to induce the Steel Ministry make a recommendation in its favour for allotment of a coal block to the coal ministry and thereafter to induce the latter to allot a captive coal block in favour of the company.

The CBI has claimed in its chargesheet that Domco Pvt. Ltd. had applied to the Steel Ministry for allotment of a captive coal block to set up a pig iron plant of two lakh tonnes per annum capacity at Rairangpur in Odisha.

The company had initially misrepresented that it had acquired 200 acres of land, whereas no land was acquired by it, the CBI said.

The probe agency added the land stated to have been acquired by the Domco, in fact, belonged to Orissa Oil Industries Ltd.

Parsad was the General Manager of Orissa Oil Industries Ltd.

--IANS

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