Coal gate: SC declines immediate relief to ex-min Santosh Bagrodia

Former union minister Santosh Bagrodia failed to get relief similar to ex-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in a coal scam case, with the Supreme Court refusing to grant him exemption from personal appearance as accused before a special court on Tuesday.

“Let him appear tomorrow. We will examine his plea shortly in eight or ten days,” a Bench headed by Justice MB Lokur said, while declining the plea of Bagrodia, former Minister of State for Coal in Singh’s cabinet, who has been summoned as accused by special CBI court in a case concerning allocation of Maharashtra’s Bander coal block to AMR Iron and Steel Pvt Ltd. “We are not dismissing his petition. Let him appear,” the Bench, also comprising Justices Kurian Joseph and AK Sikri, said as it remained unimpressed with the Congress leader’s counsel KK Venugopal, who sought parity in grant of relief given to former Prime Minister in another case of coal scam.

The Apex Court had on April 2 had stayed the trial court order summoning Singh as accused in a case pertaining to grant of Talabira-II coal block in Odisha in 2005 to Aditya Birla group company Hindalco.