After Sushma and Vasundhara, Ranjan Bhattacharya wades into row

He is allegedly pulling strings to help the scam-tainted industrialist Pramod Mittal, against whom the government-owned company State Trading Corporation (STC) is fighting hard to recover Rs 1,900 crore.

Bhattacharya had allegedly tried to influence a lot of prominent people including the PMO to go soft on Pramod Mittal. But the PMO, after his intervention,soughtdetailed report from STC but decided not to interfere in this matter. 

On the other hand, Congress leaders Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who were fighting tooth and nail in Parliament against the BJP government for going slow on black money and were appearing regularly in the court on behalf of Pramod Mittal, going against the interest of a Public Sector Company.

Meanwhile, on the basis of a report submitted by STC, the Union Commerce Ministry wrote a letter to the Ministry of External Affairs informing that Mittal was planning to switch over his Indian citizenship. 

According to information, his first preference is Montenegro (which is now part of  the European Union), second preference Bosnia and then UK.

Between 2005 and 2010, STC, as a part of the Project Export Operation, had procured raw materials on behalf of Global Steel for their Philippines operations. STC borrowed money from some nationalised banks and funded the project as a part of their routine business venture. However, Mittal’s company defaulted and STC’s dues kept on mounting as they had to bear a large interest burden.

In the last hearing which took place on August 19, 2015, the Supreme Court had directed them to deposit Rs 75 crore within September 7, 2015 and submit a definite repayment plan. Incidentally, Congress leaders Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Kapil Sibal were regularly representing Mittal in all these cases. So far, Pramod Mittal had paid Rs 586 crore against the Conciliation Agreement dated 15.11.2011.  

Due to the non-payment of the recoverable amount which is public fund, STC was incurring additional expenditure towards the interest payment to the bank and hence the financial health of the corporation took a hit.PramodMittal,brother of L N Mittal, was trying to influence the Prime Minister’s office with the help of some bureaucrats and politicians to slow down the legal proceedings against him.

His passport Z2431904, issued from London, is valid up to January 6, 2024. The break-up of the total outstanding amount of Rs 1,881.09 crore as on 30.06.2015 is: Principal amount is Rs 834 crore and interest is Rs 1,046.08 crore. 

Some of the important bureaucrats and politicians were working hard to bail out Pramod Mittal, former chairman of Global Steel Holding Ltd, to avoid the responsibility of Rs 1900 crore. STC, the public sector company, had already filed a criminal case against him to recover their dues.