Coal scam: Court to consider framing of charges on Aug 11

A special court on Tuesday fixed August 11 for consideration on framing of charges against a Ranchi-based company, its three directors and others in a coal scam case for allegedly misrepresenting facts to bag a Jharkhand coal block.

Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar put up the matter for the next date in the case, in which it had earlier summoned the accused, after taking cognizance of the CBI charge-sheet against M/S Domco Pvt Ltd, its three directors Binay Prakash, Vasant Diwakar Manjrekar and Parmananda Mondal, chartered accountants Manoj Kumar Gupta and Sanjay Khandelwal and one Shukdeo Prasad.

The court fixed the matter for consideration, after hearing the arguments on framing of charges from the counsel of CBI and the accused. The CBI had earlier filed the charge-sheet for alleged offences of cheating and criminal conspiracy under the IPC.

The CBI has claimed in its charge-sheet that Domco Pvt Ltd had applied to the Steel Ministry for allotment of a captive coal block to set up a pig iron plant of two lakh tonnes per annum capacity at Rairangpur in Odisha.

On the asking of the Ministry in November 2000, the firm had also submitted an application for allotment of coal block to the Ministry of Coal (MOC).