MML case : More than a dozen politicians, and officers caused a cumulative loss of loss of Rs.7,51,42,647/-

By Shivakumar G Malagi

May 28: Huge monetary losses allegedly suffered by the state-owned M/s Mysore Minerals Ltd (MML); on allotment of iron ore fines at the recommendations of people in political power structure would in all probabilities land more than a dozen powerful politicians in the mess of mining scam.

Since, the petitioner in the illegal mining case before the Supreme Court, Samaj Parivartan Samudaya convener S R Hiremath is set to unravel quid pro quo between powerful politicians and ore traders pushing state-owned MML towards a cumulative loss of loss of Rs.7,51,42,647 before the apex court reportedly filing an Interlocutory Application when the court reopens in first week of August.

Just when senior Congress leader D K Shivakumar is blaming petitioner for dragging him in MML scam; retired deputy director of mines and geology department R L Gaikwad prepared report had named more than a dozen politicians cutting across the party affiliations for recommending allotment of iron ore causing loss of several crores to MML.

Mr Gaikwad was a key officer in the investigating team of former Lokayukta Justice Santosh Hegde while preparing his first report on illegal mining in 2008 and has dealt in detail how the allotment of iron ore to freelance traders based on recommendations of powerful people , had resulted in huge loss for MML from 2002 to 2008.

Mr Gaikwad’s report referred as Annexure-C, captioned “Alleged irregularities by M/s MML, incidental to their trade and transactions of iron ore-an evaluation”, in the first mining report of Justice Hegde had named more than a dozen politicians cutting across the party affiliations for recommending allotment of iron ore at the loss several crores to MML.

Mr Gaikwad’s report stated that opening up of Chinese iron ore market for low grade ores from the 2002 onwards, resulted in considerable demand for the discarded iron ore fines and waste dumps which hitherto had been ignored as a mining waste. When the company started allotting waste dumps on arbitrary basis, individuals and traders approached the persons in the power structure of the government for recommendations, seeking allotment of iron ore fines and mud from the company on preferential basis.

According to his report; former minister for mines V Muniyappa had caused loss of Rs 4.82,88,460, PGR Sindhia caused loss of Rs 31, 87,858, D K Shivakumar caused loss of Rs 2, 99,800, D H Shankaramurthy caused loss of Rs 1, 06,729 and Gadilingana Gowda caused loss of Rs 59,800.

Apart from these five politicians; Annexure-C has named then MLC S M Shankar, Jagadish hettar, N Dharam Singh, B S Yeddyurappa and Allum Veerabhadrappa for recommending allotment of iron ore to several Bengaluru, Bellary, Chennai and Gujarat based ore trading companies; but Mr Gaikwad’s report has asserted that recommendations made by these politicians to different individuals did not result in loss to MML.

Besides; Annexure-C had pointed out that cumulative loss on various counts during the tenures of as many as eight IAS and IPS officers served as Managing Directors of MML, whose stay was less than 6-months at a stretch from 1999 to 2008 amounting to whopping Rs 642 crore.