Letter to PM on Hindalco in "best interests" of state: Naveen

With CBI indicating that he may be questioned in the coal scam, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today said his letter to the Prime Minister to "examine expeditiously" Hindalco's request for block allotment was in keeping the "best interests" of the state in mind.
Patnaik at the same time asserted that as per the procedure for coal block allocation the final decision rests with the central government
"I had urged the prime minister to examine Hindalco's request for coal block ... But as per the procedure for coal block allocation, the final decision rests with the central government," the BJD Chief told reporters while admitting that he had written a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Patnaik in his letter sent on August 17, 2005 had said, "I would strongly urge you to have the matter examined so that this vitally important project is provided with required coal linkage at an early date."
A copy of the letter was released by the chief minister's office today.
"I repeat again, the letter that was written to the central government was to examine the request of Hindalco and I want to clarify that the job of allocating coal block lies with the central government," he said.

"And no information at all has been received from the CBI about questioning or otherwise."

The Odisha government also simultaneously released a statement explaining the circumstances under which the letter was written.
"Keeping the best interests of the state in mind, the Chief Minister had written a letter to the PM indicating that Hindalco's request for Talabira II coal block in the IB valley of Jharsuguda district be examined," it said.
Patnaik's remarks and the statement came in the wake of indications by CBI that it may question Patnaik in connection with alleged irregularities in allocation of coal block to Hindalco as he had written a letter to the Coal Ministry after application of the Aditya Birla company was rejected in 2005.

The state government said Patnaik had requested the prime minister for examining Hindalco's request for the block as the company was "setting up an aluminium smelter of a capacity of 260,000 tonnes per annum in Sambalpur district, adjoining Jharsuguda, for which they needed a captive power plant of 900MW capacity."
Since power is a major raw material for an aluminium project and such a project has the added benefit of promoting value addition in the state, "thereby adding to our revenue and generating employment, we had asked the central government to examine the request," the statement said.