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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Bail for Essar manager by Jaideep Hardikar

Bail for Essar manager by Jaideep Hardikar

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published Published on Jan 6, 2012   modified Modified on Jan 6, 2012

A Dantewada district court yesterday granted bail to D.V.C.S. Verma, the general manager of an Essar Steel plant, who was arrested last September in a case of alleged protection pay to Maoists.

The court said investigators had not been able to provide any concrete evidence against the official.

Chhattisgarh police had arrested Verma based on the statement of a local contractor, B.K. Lala, who was allegedly caught red-handed while paying Rs 15 lakh in cash to a suspected Maoist conduit, Lingaram Kodopi.

After the arrest of Lala and Kodopi, the police had alleged that the cash was meant to be handed over to the Maoists on behalf of Essar as protection money to safeguard the company’s interests in Bastar and neighbouring Odisha and that Verma was in the know. The company had denied paying any protection money to the rebels.

Essar has a beneficiation plant at Kirandul, south of Dantewada town, around the Bacheli and Bailadila iron ore mines of the National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC). The company has laid a 267km pipeline from Kirandul to Vishakhapatnam through the Maoist-controlled territory.

Essar pumps iron-ore dust slurry through this pipeline to Vishakhapatnam where it makes iron pellets to be shipped to its steel plant in Hazira, along the Gujarat coast. The Maoists had blown the pipeline in 2010 and Essar was making a desperate attempt to repair and restart its operations after the huge losses.

Verma, the police had alleged while placing him under arrest following the arrest of Lala and Kodopi, was arrested based on Lala’s statement. While granting a conditional bail, the court asked Verma not to leave the country without its permission. Verma was released from Jagdalpur central jail last evening.

Securing bail in the case was difficult, given the charges pressed against the Essar GM, but the district court reportedly observed that Verma’s case was different from the other accused and that the investigators had not been able to produce any evidence other than contractor Lala’s statement.

The Dantewada police had arrested Verma and others under different sections of the IPC, Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, and the provisions of the Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Regulation.

The police had also arrested Kodopi’s relative, Soni Sori, from Delhi in October, accusing her to be an alleged Maoist conduit involved in the case.

The police had alleged that Sori was present in the market with Kodopi to receive the money from Lala but had escaped the spot. Sori has, since her arrest, accused the Dantewada police of torturing her in their custody, following which human rights groups in Delhi had moved the Supreme Court seeking to transfer her outside Chhattisgarh.

She and other two accused in the case are currently lodged up in the Jagdalpur central prison.

The Raman Singh government had handed over the probe to a special investigations team from the Dantewada police in October, but the Opposition Congress has alleged that the probe is being deliberately slowed down.

Yesterday in Raipur, while interacting with reporters, Chhattisgarh director general of police Anil Navaney refused to comment on the case saying it would be premature to talk about the case since the SIT investigations are not yet over.


The Telegraph, 5 January, 2012, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1120106/jsp/nation/story_14969869.jsp


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