The Supreme Court on Thursday came down on the Centre for allotting coal blocks to companies by undermining the Mines and Minerals Act, which empowers only state governments, and not the Union government, to make such allocations, saying the Centre has to give “legal explanation” on the matter.
The apex court also pulled up the CBI for not sharing details of its probe of the multi-crore coal block allocation scam with the apex judicial body, saying it was “strange” that the agency expressed reservations about sharing details of its ongoing probe into irregularities in allocations for coal mining.
A bench comprising Justices R.M. Lodha and J. Chelameswar directed the CBI to submit a status report so the court can confirm that the probe is going in the right direction.