A special court today awarded a four-year jail term to the director of Gondwana Ispat Ltd in a coal scam case related to the allocation...

A special court today awarded a four-year jail term to the director of Gondwana Ispat Ltd in a coal scam case related to the allocation of the Majra coal block in Maharashtra. Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar, who was appointed to deal exclusively with coal scam cases, also imposed a fine of Rs 1 crore on the firm's director Ashok Daga and Rs 60 lakh on the firm. Daga has been in custody since April 27 after the court had held that the firm and its director were guilty of cheating and criminal conspiracy to get the coal block in Maharashtra allocated to it.

Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar

The court had earlier summoned Daga and the firm as accused of misrepresenting facts to get the Majra coal block allocated to it. Daga and the firm have been convicted under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 420 (cheating) of the IPC and also for the substantive offense under section 420 of the IPC. The firm was allocated the Majra coal block in 2003 and an FIR was lodged against it in 2014.