The Supreme Court on Friday widened the ambit of the CBI probe against former Karnataka minister Gali Janardhan Reddy to include an investigation into two of his companies’ illegal mining activities in Karnataka.
The new CBI probe is a ticking bomb for both Reddy and former chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa who doubled as minister for mines, and for their party, the BJP which has mounted a high decibel anti-corruption crusade against the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre, but will now have to cope with an investigation into illegal mining, said to have funded the party’s acquisition of some 16 legislators in the state.
Reddy, arrested by the CBI on September 5 for illegal mining by his Obulapurum Mining Company (OMC) in Ananthapur district of Andhra, will now face an embarrassing investigation into irregularities committed by newly acquired Associated Mining Company (AMC) in Karnataka.
While seeking a status report from CBI by September 30 on investigation of the OMC’s illegal mining in Andhra, a forest Bench also directed the agency to investigate illegal mining by Deccan Mining Syndicate (DMS) on a vast area leased out to the central PSU National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) in Bellary area.
The CBI investigation was ordered by the apex court following the report of the Central Empowered Committee (CEC) alleging that AMC, having a small lease of nearly 16 hectares in Jaisinghpur in Karnataka, was used by Reddy as “camouflage” for routing illegally extracted iron ore from Karnataka to Obulapuram in AP and then exporting it, showing it as if it had been extracted there. DMS had indulged in large scale illegal mining on NMDC lease.
‘Republic of Bellary’ did Reddys in
* Senior counsel Prashant Bhushan’s reading of Chapter 28 of Justice N. Santosh Hegde’s report on illegal mining, the chapter on the “Republic of Bellary” drove home the clout of the Reddy brothers in their home district, and spurred the Supreme Court to order a probe by the CBI into Associated Mining Company (AMC) on Friday.
Counsel for the state government, Raju Ramachandran, had almost convinced the Bench to put off a decision when Bhushan, counsel for the petitioners, intervened.
* Deccan Mining Syndicate, a leading producer and exporter of iron ore, owned by S.M. Jain, has offices on Kempe Gowda Road, Bengaluru and a corporate office in Bellary.