Panaji: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Goa police probing the illegal mining scams has issued fresh summons to Goa’s former Principal Secretary Rajiv Yaduvanshi (IAS) to appear before it on November 15. The SIT had questioned him on Friday and Saturday.
A senior official in the SIT said on Saturday that Mr. Yaduvanshi, who is currently Health Secretary in the Delhi administration, was quizzed on Friday for four hours and on Saturday for two hours. Mr. Yaduvanshi was quizzed for allegedly condoning the delay in renewing lapsed mining leases of Kadnekar Mining during the Digambar Kamat government.
Mr. Yaduvanshi had one of the longest innings in the State administration as Secretary of Mines, which covered the tenures of three Chief Ministers from 2005 to 2011: Manohar Parrikar (with Digambar Kamat as Mines Minister), Pratapsingh Rane and Digambar Kamat.
Under the 1987 Act, all title concessionaires were expected to apply for leases within a year, failing which their leases would lapse and be time-barred. The deadline for the application for renewing leases was 1987-88 and it was time-barred. Several leaseholders happened to file the applications after the deadline, but the Mines Department did not entertain them. Applications filed in 1996 were not condoned and they were time-barred.
However, according to probe by the SIT, Mr. Kamat in his capacity as Mines Minister in the previous period and subsequently as Chief Minister is alleged to have personally entertained applications for renewals of leases filed as late as 1996 and 2000. Ten applications for renewal were filed in 1996 and two applications in 2000. Of that, Mr. Kamat is alleged to have condoned delays in two cases and kept the remaining eight applications “under process.”
In one ‘condoned’ case, three mines of the late Zoiram Neogui were handed over to a Congress man, Dinar P. Kamat Tarcar, who ran these mines through his company Minescape Earth Movers Pvt Ltd.
In the second condoned case, operator Magnum Minerals extracted iron ore from Maina mines, whose application for the renewal of lease was filed in 2000 on behalf of the late owner Voicunta Canecar (Kadnekar).
Zoiram Neogui’s application was filed in 1996, but Tarcar appeared as attorney for all the legal heirs of Zoiram and argued that the delay be condoned in 2005. The then Mines Minister condoned the delay on humanitarian grounds because of the death of Zoiram and secondly because the Goa government was taking a liberal approach to condoning delays. Mr. Kamat has persistently denied the charges of any vested interest in condoning the delay.
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