india

Updated: Jul 04, 2019 23:27 IST

The Supreme Court sought Centre’s response on Thursday to a plea seeking quashing of allotment, extension or continuation of leases to firms for mining iron ore from over 358 mines across the country.

The petition filed by advocate ML Sharma contended that mining leases were granted without following the due procedure in law.

A bench led by Justice SA Bobde gave four weeks time to Centre after additional solicitor general ANS Nadkarni asked for time to place a written response. The court remarked it needed time to hear the issue at length.

Nadkarni told the court that a “mala fide” plea has been filed and he, therefore, wanted some time to respond to it.

SC had on April 16 issued notice to the Centre on Sharma’s plea that has also sought a direction to the CBI to register a criminal case to probe the matter. Senior advocate PS Narasimha has been appointed by the court as an amicus curiae in the case.

According to Sharma he learnt in February this year that 288 mining leases were extended in exchange of “large donations” to political parties that has created a “serious financial loss” to the tune of ₹4 lakh crore to public exchequer.

Leases have been either granted or extended to the firms without either any fresh evaluation or adopting the auction process. Sharma has sought directions for recovery of market value of the minded minerals in accordance with the law.