Questioning the alleged violation of norms while allocating coal blocks, the Supreme Court today gave the Centre eight weeks time to explain what went wrong in the process.
The Supreme Court was acting on a petition filed by the Centre for Public Interest Litigation.
Lawyer MN Sharma, who filed the petition on behalf of Centre for Public Interest Litigation, said the guidelines were flouted during the allocation of coal blocks and they need to be reallocated.
Supreme Court of India. Reuters
The apex court bench constituting Justice RL Lodha and Justice Anil R Dave wanted to know if it was a coincidence that most of the allocated blocks had some connection to politicians.
The bench also observed that the CAG is a constitutional authority and there is nothing wrong in relying on its report.
Taking the matter seriously, the apex court observed that the government owes an explanation in this regard. The court also turned down the government’s plea that the matter should not dealt with by the highest court as the Public Accounts Committee is already looking into it.
