House, office of Central Coalfields' chief, 9 officials raided

House, office of Central Coalfields' chief, 9 officials raided
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE

RANCHI, NOV 22: The raids on the office and residence of Central Coalfields Ltd (CCL) Chairman-cum-Managing Director Balaswami Akla here on Friday have reportedly led to seizure of several files relating to supplies to the well-known coal mafia bigwigs of Dhanbad -- Mahesh Gandhi and Ramesh Gandhi.

The coal was reportedly supplied to the two illegally by Akla in 1991, when he was Bharat Coking Coal Ltd's (BCCL) general manager. However, no arrests have been made so far.

Akla was reportedly tipped to become Coal India Ltd's CMD after the Public Enterprise Selection Board cleared his name for the job in July. Although the CBI's Ranchi branch Superintendent of Police Narayan Jha refused to comment, sources said that during raids on Akla's residence, cash worth Rs 5 lakh, imported liquor, 1.7 kg of gold and a dozen passbooks of bank accounts were seized.

In addition, the agency reportedly recovered documents showing Akla owned two flats in the name of his relatives and a ``palatial house'' worth about Rs 50 lakh in Chennai.

Apart from Akla, the offices and residences of nine CIL personnel and coal merchants, including Mahesh and Ramesh Gandhi, former coal controller P.N. Tiwari, former chief GMs (sales) R.P. Srivasrava and A.K. Srivastava, Chief Engineer K.N. Singh and former superintending engineers Sudershan Singh in Ranchi, Calcutta, Patna, Bhojpur, Chennai, Dhanbad and Kanpur were searched by CBI sleuths in simultaneous raids.

These officers are alleged to have eased allotments of coal to the mafia, causing losses to the tune of Rs 90 lakh to the public-sector companies CCL and BCCL.