Allegations against DyCM over project allotment; firm, BJP

A Chennai-based firm is in the midst of a row after a media report claimed it was favoured by Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh in allotment of a solar power project in Jammu and Kashmir but the company said the project was approved by the previous Omar Abdullah government after following due procedures.
BJP, to which Nirmal Singh belongs, also rubbished the allegations against the Deputy CM, saying the project was allotted by the previous government and the present dispensation had made no changes in it.
A Jammu-based newspaper has alleged that Singh had tried to influence a senior bureaucrat to allot "without tenders" the Photo-voltaic Power Plant project at an estimated cost of Rs 700 crore on 300 acres of land at Chann Arrorian in Kathua district of Jammu region. Singh holds Power portfolio.

In wake of the report, the opposition NC sought a probe while Congress demanded Singh's resignation.
Adil Khan, who is one of the directors of the firm M/S Then India Energy Private Limited, told reporters here today that the Power Department had "no" role in the project and "it was the previous National Conference (NC)-Congress coalition government which had actually approved" it.
"The approval committee of the Science and Technology Department of that government approved the project on April 9, 2013 and then they (executing agency) followed the procedures," he said while reacting to the report.

Khan, who hails from Kashmir, said the firm was suffering due to the controversy. He said, "It is we who are suffering due to the fight between bureaucrats and politicians. Is it because I am a Kashmiri that I am being cornered?"

Strongly refuting the charges against Singh, state BJP chief spokesman Sunil Sethi said the project was not allotted by the present government but by the previous Omar Abdullah government had awarded it to the said company in 2014.
"Rs 700 crore of 100 MW Solar Power Project for Chann Arrorian in Kathua district, Solar Power Plant to Then India Energy Pvt Ltd Chennai firm were approved when National Conference and Congress were running the government in Jammu and Kashmir in 2013," he told reporters in Jammu.
"It was awarded to the company when the Department of Power Development as well as Science & Technology were headed by the then Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and another by minister of NC," he said.

Khan said the firm was setting up the 100 Mega Watt (MW) solar power project for the benefit of the people of the state and there was "no need" for tendering or any biding for the project as there was no investment from the government.
"I want to go for solar farming. It is my land and there is no issue of tendering," he said.
"The Power Department has no role in the project except signing the Power Purchase Agreement (PPA). I am neither affiliated with any political party nor am clarifying on behalf of the Deputy Chief Minister," he said.