Coal scam: India Inc, ministers back Birla, Parakh
Two days after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed an FIR or a first information report against Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla and former Coal Secretary PC Parakh in the coal block allocation scam, India Inc has huddled together.
"Business leaders can not be made scapegoats of mere suspicion and misconstrued actions," Naina Lal Kidwai, president of industry body Ficci, said in a statement.
Ms Kidwai also stressed that such actions will have far reaching effects on bureaucratic decision making and it will impede critical decisions.
"Highly regarded and well equipped bureaucrats end up taking not the right decisions because those decisions come back to haunt them 8-10 years later, bureaucrats and ministers don't want to meet industry because just the mere meeting is read as-well, you lobbied to change something," Ms Kidwai told NDTV. (Watch)
The move by CBI is likely to dent national psyche and dampen investor confidence, say India's top corporate leaders.
"He is straight as an arrow...ludicrous that an FIR has been filed against Kumar Mangalam Birla," HDFC chairman Deepak Parekh, said adding, "Our system is such that the biggest fraudsters go scot-free, innocents are harassed."
Former Infosys board member Mohandas Pai and Piramal Group chairman Ajay Piramal also expressed solidarity and concern.
Faced with an India Inc that is livid at Mr Birla being accused of cheating by the CBI, Commerce Minister Anand Sharma reached out saying the government values India's corporate leaders and that their integrity cannot be questioned.
"This is vitiating economic environment, hurting India, creating fear and suspicion," Mr Sharma said.
Echoing Mr Sharma's thoughts Corporate Affairs Minister Sachin Pilot said, "We must ensure such that such actions are based on hard facts and do not create an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty."
The CBI in its FIR has claimed aluminium-maker Hindalco, a unit of the Aditya Birla Group, was shown "undue favour" in obtaining mining rights in 2005. It has accused Mr Birla and Mr Parakh of conspiracy in the coal allotments.
In the FIR, the investigating agency has said that Hindalco's application was first rejected citing reasons. But after Mr Birla met Mr Parakh in July 2005, the coal secretary ignored the deliberations of the screening committee and allotted Hindalco a coal block.
Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh headed the coal ministry in 2005 and between 2006 and 2009 when many of the allocations were made. He has strongly rejected accusations of wrongdoing in what has come to be dubbed "Coalgate".
