Court convicts private company, its directors in coal scam case
Aspecial court on Thursday convicted Adhunik Corporation Ltd and its two directors of cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy in a case related to the alleged irregularities in the allocation of Patrapara coal block in Odisha to the firm. Special Judge Arun Bhardwaj held the company and its directors — Nirmal Kumar Agarwal and Mahesh Kumar Agarwal — guilty, holding that they entered into a criminal conspiracy (under Section 120-B of IPC) to cheat Ministry of Coal for allocation of coal block in their favour. “The circumstantial evidence in this case unerringly points to the conspiracy amongst the accused and there is no other inference except the inference of criminal conspiracy to secure allocation of a coal block by cheating Ministry of Steel, Screening Committee and Ministry of Coal, Government of India,” the judge said. The judge also convicted the accused of cheating (Section 420 of IPC) Ministry of Steel, Screening Committee and Ministry of Coal for allocation of coal bloc...