RSPL, three officials held guilty in Kesla coal scam case

NEW DELHI: A special court on Tuesday convicted a private company and its three top officials in the Kesla North coal allocation scam case. With Tuesday's ruling, the case — which pertains to alleged irregularities in allocation of the said block in Chhattisgarh to Rathi Steel and Power Ltd (RSPL) — became the second matter in the set of coal scam cases to reach its conclusion. 20 other coal scam cases are pending and are at various stages of trial in the special court, which exclusively hears coal scam cases.

The court had delivered its first verdict in the coal block allocation scam cases on March 28 in Jharkhand's North Dhadu coal scam case in which Jharkhand Ispat Private Limited (JIPL) and its two directors were held guilty.

Pronouncing the verdict in the Kesala North coal scam case, Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar convicted the firm RSPL and its three top officials - Managing Director Pradeep Rathi, Chief Executive Officer Udit Rathi and AGM Kushal Aggarwal — for offences of cheating and criminal conspiracy. The court will hear arguments on quantum of sentence for the convicts later in the day.

Earlier, while framing charges against the four accused, the court had observed that they had conspired and furnished wrong information to get coal block and misappropriated nationalised natural resources.

CBI had only chargesheeted RSPL and Udit Rathi as accused in the case for the alleged offences of criminal conspiracy and cheating. However, after considering the charge sheet, the court also summoned the other two, Pradeep Rathi and Kushal Aggarwal, as accused in the case.

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