Dubbing CAG's computation of loss of Rs1.86 lakh crore in coal block
allocation as "flawed" and "misleading", Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh today took the battle to the Opposition camp, blaming it for thwarting
the Centre's effort to shift to competitive bidding.
Making a statement in both Houses of Parliament amid uproar created by BJP
members, Singh refused to be on the back foot, declaring that he takes
"full responsibility" for the decisions taken as he contended that
CAG's "observations" are "clearly disputable".
With BJP creating disruptions, he read out a few portions of his four-page
statement before laying it in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha which were repeatedly
adjourned because of uproar.
Conscious that the CAG reports are normally discussed in detail in the
Public Accounts Committee of Parliament where the ministry concerned responds,
Singh said he was departing from this established procedure "because of
the nature of the allegations that are being made and because I was holding the
charge of Coal Minister for a part of the time covered by the report."
Responding point-by-point to the CAG's observations, the Prime Minister said
even if the government auditor's contention that benefits accrued to private
companies were accepted, "their computations can be questioned on a number
of technical points."
He asserted that aggregating the "purported gains" to private
parties "merely on the basis of the average production costs and sale
price of CIL (Coal India Limited) could be highly misleading."
As coal blocks were allocated to private companies only for captive purposes
for specified end-uses, he said, it would not be appropriate to link the
allocated blocks to the price of coal set by CIL.
Posted in: India News
