Coalgate: CBI affidavit to Supreme Court states changes proposed by Law Minister, PMO official

NEW DELHI: CBI director Ranjit Sinha on Monday told the Supreme Court that the meeting, in which law minister Ashwani Kumar went through the draft status report on the probe into the coal block allocation case, was not called at its request nor anyone let off in the process.

He also admitted that the cbi had been in "regular interaction" with joint secretary PMO Shatrughna Singh and coal Joint Secretary A K Bhalla with regard to the pending enquiry.

"Sharing of the status reports with the persons mentioned above and the consequent changes therein have neither altered the central theme of the report nor shifted the focus on enquiries or investigations in any manner."

"No names of suspect or accused were removed from the status reports and also that no suspect or accused were let off in the process."

The CBI claimed that it did not occur to it to bring this to the notice of the court as it was "our honest and bona fide belief that there was no specific direction on this issue by the court".

The CBI director also blamed former asg harin raval for misleading the court saying his statement that the draft status report was not shared by anyone was "not made on the instructions of the CBI".

The CBI director also submitted in a sealed cover the changes made in the draft status report but said "it is diificult at this stage to attribute each change to a particular person with certainty".

He says that most changes were done by his officers in consulation with the asg or the law minister, a few at the instance of the AG and PMO and law ministry officials.

The affidavit claimed that the law minister only saw draft status report relating to PE2 (allocations between 2006 and 2OO9).

It claimed that the ag saw PE 2 and PE4 (allocations between 1993 to 2005). Coal and pmo officials also went through them and suggested some amendments.

The law minister deleted from the draft report a finding about the screening committee not preparing any broad sheet or chart about applicants and also a sentence about legality of allocations while amendments in law were in process.

Coal and pmo officials also deleted a finding about the lack of a weightage system in allocations.

The CBI director also claimed that status reports on regular cases were seen neither by the political executive or the ag or the officials.

The affidavit also backed the ag saying; "AG neither asked for nor was given a copy of the final status reports" but admitted he made "minor changes" in status report of PE2.