With the Opposition aggressively targeting the government on the issue of the missing files relating to coal block allocation, the top Congress leadership on Wednesday discussed a counter-strategy at its core group meeting which was told that several files have been traced and only eight remained untraced.
At the meeting, attended by Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, coal minister Sriprakash Jaiswal is learnt to have given a detailed briefing on the issue of missing files.
The meeting, which was also attended by law minister Kapil Sibal, devised ways to counter the Opposition attack which is likely to continue in Parliament on Thursday after Wednesday’s holiday.
Mr Jaiswal is understood to have said that 769 files and other documents, including application for coal blocks, had been given to the CBI by the coal ministry soon after the investigating agency began its probe in May, sources said.