CBI registers FIR against its former director Ranjit Sinha in coal scam case

New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday filed an FIR against its former director Ranjit Sinha to probe the allegations that he scuttled the coal scam probe when he was chief of the agency.

The CBI registered the case three months after the Supreme Court ordered a probe against Sinha for his alleged involvement in the scam.

The Supreme Court had constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT), to be headed by the CBI Director, to look into the prima facie allegations against Sinha. A bench headed by Justice MB Lokur had said the CBI Director can take assistance of two officers of his choice after duly intimating the apex court.

The scam took place when the Congress was in power and Manmohan Singh was the prime minister.

The apex court had on July 12 last year reserved the order on the issue after Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi told the Bench that the panel headed by former CBI Special Director M.L. Sharma has held that Mr. Sinha’s meetings with some high-profile accused in the scam, prima facie indicated that there was an attempt to influence the investigation.

Rohtagi, who had only received an initial report of the panel for perusal on condition of confidentiality, had said he had gone through the report which has found that the visitors’ diary at Mr. Sinha’s residence was genuine.

However, he had said the correctness of entries in that diary could only be ascertained in the court through evidence.

The apex court-appointed panel was probing the alleged scuttling of probe into coal block allocation scam cases by Mr. Sinha, whose meetings with the accused persons were held as “completely inappropriate“.

On December 7, 2015, the court had ordered handing over the original visitors’ diary of the official residence of the former CBI Director to the Sharma-led panel.