Coal scam: Former Union Minister Dilip Ray sentenced to 3 years jail

A Special CBI court on Monday sentenced former Union Minister Dilip Ray to threeyears imprisonment in a coal block allocation case Ray was the Minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government in 1999The case pertains to allocation of 105153 hectares of nonnationalised and abandoned coal mining area in Jharkhands Giridih district in favour of Castron Technologies Limited by 14th Screening Committee of the Ministry of Coal in 1999Special Judge Bharat Parashar also awarded three years term each to two senior officials of the Ministry of Coal at that time Pradip Kumar Banerjee and Nitya Nand Gautam and Castron Technologies Limiteds Director Mahendra Kumar Agarwalla The judge also imposed a fine of Rs 10 lakh on them Rs 60 lakh on Castron Technologies Limited and Rs 10 lakh on Castron Mining Limited The CBI had earlier urged the court to award life imprisonment to Ray and other convicts to send a message to the society as whitecollar crimes were on a riseThe convicts had requested the court to take a lenient view in respect of their old age and prior clean antecedents On October 6 the court had convicted them in the case noting that they conspired together beyond shadows of all reasonable doubts to procure allocation of the coal blockBesides Ray two former senior officials of the Ministry of Coal Pradip Kumar Banerjee the then Additional Secretary and Nitya Nand Gautam former advisor Projects Castron Technologies Limited its director Mahendra Kumar Agarwalla and Castron Mining Limited have also been found guiltyThe court held them guilty of the offences under 120B criminal conspiracy 409 criminal breach of trust and 420 cheating of the Indian Penal Code and various sections of the Prevention of Corruption ActBesides this Castron Technologies Limited Mahesh Kumar Agarwalla and Castron Mining Limited were also held guilty for the offence under 379 punishment for theft and 34 common intention of the Indian Penal CodeAs many as 51 witnesses were examined in the case The prosecution had argued that the facts and circumstances of the case clearly pointed to the hatching of a criminal conspiracy by the private parties and the public servants involved in the process of allocation of impugned coal blockIt was submitted that Brahmadiha coal block was not a nationalised coal mine and was not included by CIL or its subsidiary companies in the identified list of captive coal blocks to be allocated by the Ministry of CoalSenior Public Prosecutor AP Singh had told the court that as Brahmadiha coal block was not an identified captive coal block to be allocated to private parties even the screening committee was not competent to consider its allocation to any company much less to Castron Technologies LimitedThe prosecution further stated that Dilip Ray had himself approved the guidelines of the Coal Ministry that no coal block shall be allocated for captive mining to a company engaged in production of iron and steel or sponge iron if the annual production capacity is less than one MTPA in opencast mining but in the case of Castron Technologies Limited he agreed to relax the said guidelines so as to extend undue benefits to the private parties involvedKeep scrolling to read more newsCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new mid day Android and iOS apps to get latest updates MidDay is now on Telegram Click here to join our channel middayinfomedialtd and stay updated with the latest newsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever