Reddys' mining biz to come under CBI scanner

A division bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court set aside on Thursday the earlier stay imposed on the agency against probing into the mining operations through an order of a single judge Bench of the same court.

The court order will empower the CBI to look into aspects of not only the illegal mining in areas not leased to the Obulapuram Mining Company (OMC) owned by G Karunakara Reddy and Janardhana Reddy but also probe evasion of royalty, road tax and other revenues to the state exchequer to the tune of Rs 3,200 crore.
The judgment was pronounced by the Bench of Chief Justice Nisar Ahmad Kakru and Justice Vilas V Afzalpurkar.

Panel visit on Dec 21

Meanwhile, the empowered committee set up by the apex court is going to the OMC mining areas on December 21  for  a field visit and to inspect the mining operations of OMC and five other companies in the region. It will ascertain whether they were undertaking illegal mining in forest  areas .

Earlier, the CBI had urged Andhra Pradesh High Court to allow it to investigate the allegations of illegal mining of iron ore being carried out by six companies on the AP, Karnataka border areas of Bellary and Anantapur districts.

“The Obulapuram Mining Company has been trying to take cover under the border dispute by arguing that it should not be charged with illegal mining unless its encroachment into un-allotted mining area is established,” said a senior CBI official.