Coal scam: CBI questions Naveen Jindal

Three months after registering an FIR against him, CBI today questioned Congress MP and industrialist Naveen Jindal in connection with a case of alleged cheating and criminal conspiracy in bagging Amarkonda Murgadangal coal block in Jharkhand in 2008.
Highly-placed sources in the agency said Jindal was summoned by CBI after which he expressed the desire to appear before it today.
He met the investigation team in the afternoon and his examination continued till late in the evening, the sources said.
The agency conceded to his request that he should not be subjected to media glare after which the venue was changed from the CBI headquarters to a safe house where his examination took place, they said.

The agency has booked him in its 12th FIR in connection with coal blocks allocation scam registered in June this year.
Former Minister of State for Coal Dasari Narayan Rao has also been booked by the agency in the case.

Neither the company JSPL nor Jindal gave their comments on the issue as messages and emails sent to them remained unanswered.
During its probe into the scam, it was for the first time the then Minister of State was named as an accused in an FIR by CBI in which it was alleged that he had received Rs 2.25 crore camouflaged as investment from one of Jindal's firms within a year of allocation of a coal block to him.

CBI sources said Jindal Steel and Power Limited and Gagan Sponge Iron Limited, also a Jindal firm, had bagged Amarkonda Murgadangal coal block in Birbhum, Jharkhand in 2008 by alleged misrepresentation of facts when Rao was the Minister of State for Coal.
CBI has claimed in its FIR that the misrepresentation was allegedly done on three counts--land, water supply and previous allocations.