HC notice to Centre on plea alleging over-invoicing by power firms

The Delhi High Court on Monday issued notice to the Centre and Directorate of Revenue of Intelligence (DRI) seeking an SIT probe into alleged over-invoicing of equipment and fuel imported for power plants by the electricity generating companies of Adani and Essar groups.

A division bench of Justice S. Ravindra Bhat and Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva sought response from the Central government and the DRI by February 7, 2018.

The Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was filed jointly by two NGOs -- Centre for Public Interest Litigation and Common Cause -- who alleged that the power firms belonging to the two groups were allegedly inflating the value of imports for their power plants to siphon money abroad and avail higher power rate compensation.

Prashant Bhushan, appearing for NGOs, claimed that the DRI had earlier unearthed that public and private sector energy companies were siphoning away several thousands crores of rupees abroad.

The PILs added: "Most of these over-invoicing instances have been reported from the power sector, the impact of which is felt by the millions of the electricity consumers in the form of higher tariff."

The petitioners said that they are concerned about the increasing trend of over-invoicing by the private companies in the power sector with huge public interest ramifications.

"In the last three or four years, several major instances of such over-invoicing have been unearthed by the DRI in which several prominent and influential companies are involved. The modus operandi is identical in all these cases.

"The coal or power equipment even though is shipped directly to India, but its invoicing is routed through a different company incorporated abroad which is directly owned and controlled by the promoters of the project in India."

Elaborating the modus operandi, the NGOs, in the pleas, gave an example. They said suppose the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) of power equipment is located in China, but it raises the invoice in the name of a company located in, say, UAE, and the UAE-based company then raises its own invoice by inflating the value on the Indian company. But Chinese OEM ships the equipment directly to India.

The plea added that thus it is clear that such companies have much to hide in the way they have indulged in huge over-invoicing of coal imported from Indonesia in order to siphon off money from India to cheat the consumers and the shareholders.

"The said case is a clear criminal offence and needs a thorough investigation by an SIT."

The CBI had registered a Preliminary Enquiry (PE) based on the DRI showcause notice to Adani in May 2014, however, the CBI apparently closed it without even registering an FIR during the tenure of then CBI Director Ranjit Sinha," the pleas said.

--IANS

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