Coal scam: Supreme Court to hear SLP against HC order on May 15, says CBI

NEW DELHI: CBI today told a special court that their appeal against the Delhi High Court order quashing charges against Prakash Industries Ltd (PIL) and its director in a coal blocks allocation scam case is slated to come up for hearing before the Supreme Court on May 15.

The agency said that a special leave petition (SLP) was preferred against the high court's September 5, 2014 verdict quashing charges of cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy framed by the trial court against the firm and its Director (Corporate Affairs) A K Chaturvedi.

"It has been submitted by the senior public prosecutor that the SLP preferred by CBI against the order of the high court is slated to come up for hearing before the Supreme Court on May 15. Accordingly, the present matter be now put on July 20," Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar said.

The agency had earlier informed the court that the appeal was filed in the apex court after the Law Ministry had given its nod to do so.

The other two accused in the case are Goutam Kumar Basak, Executive Secretary of Steel Ministry's Joint Plant Committee, and Soumen Chatterjee, Manager (F&A) of the committee.

Both Basak and Chatterjee had sought alteration of charges framed against them earlier in view of the high court order. The plea is pending before the special court.

Basak and Chatterjee were earlier put on trial on charges of cheating, forgery and other offences under IPC and under provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act for allegedly giving a misleading report regarding PIL's production capacity.

The Joint Plant Committee was set up in 1964 by the government to formulate guidelines for production, allocation and pricing of iron and steel and is the only institution which is officially empowered by the Steel Ministry to collect data on iron and steel industry.