Union Coal minister Shriprakash Jaiswal on Saturday admitted that the coal mafia were active in the coal industry.
“Mafia are still there in the coal industry.....it will take another 10 to 20 years to rid the industry of the mafia,” Jaiswal told reporters after attending a function in Allahabad.
“I cannot say that the mafia have been wiped out completely from the coal industry,” he added.
The minister’s confession comes after former Union coal secretary P C Parakh’s letters written to the prime minister in 2005 stating that the coal ministry, then headed by Shibu Soren, was “run by mafia”.
The CBI has accused Parakh of conspiracy and cheating in the allotment of two coal blocks to industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla in Odisha.
Soren had allegedly tried to get Parakh transferred out of the coal ministry owing to his advocacy of the bidding process for coal licenses, which the minister opposed.
Published 26 October 2013, 20:29 IST