Special Court acquits AES Chhatisgarh Energy, Sanjay Aggarwal in coal scam case
Dec 19, 2023
New Delhi [India], December 19 : The Special Court examining Coal scam-related cases on Tuesday acquitted the accused person Sanjay Aggarwal and the co-accused company, AES Chhattisgarh Energy.
Additional Sessions Judge Arun Bhardwaj while passing the judgement in this regard stated that sections 420/120B IPC were not made out against the accused persons and therefore, was pleased to acquit both the accused persons.
On 06.11.2007, Sayang Coal Block, Chhattisgarh was allocated to AES Chhattisgarh Energy which is a subsidiary of AES Corp. Delaware, United States, a leading global power company.
However, on 06.05.2015, FIR was registered under section 120B/420 IPC and Section 13(2)/13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act,1988 against AES Chhattisgarh Energy, its Directors, and officials of the Ministry of Coal and Screening Committee based on the allegation that AES Chhattisgarh had misrepresented the fact that it was a subsidiary of AES Corp USA, although, at the relevant time, it was not subsidiary of AES Corp USA.
On 09.01.2017, CBI charge sheeted AES Chhattisgarh Energy and one of its Directors Sanjay Aggarwal under section 420/120B IPC. The main allegation against the company and its Director was that the Coal Block got allocated to the company based on deceitful concealment of material fact, i.e., the company was not a subsidiary of AES Corp, USA.
Senior Advocate Vikas Pahwa appeared for the company and Sanjay Aggarwal argued that AES Chhattisgarh Energy had made no misrepresentation as it had time and again informed the Authorities that it was yet to become a subsidiary of the AES Corp. USA and thus, Section 420 IPC was not made out as there was no mens rea on the part of accused persons.
It was also argued by the Senior Advocate, that 120B IPC cannot be attracted when one accused is a "person" and the co-accused is a "Company" as there must be 2 persons for the said section to be made out.
During the final arguments, lawyers appearing for AES Chhattisgarh Energy and Sanjay Aggarwal, submitted that the investigation w.r.t. AES Chhattisgarh being a subsidiary company of AES Corp., USA was conducted in sheer ignorance of the provisions of the Companies Act, 1956.
It was further argued that the Company was a subsidiary of AES Corp. USA given the Sections 4(1)(a) r/w 4(2)(b) and 4(2)(c) of Companies Act, 1956 as the AES Corp. USA used to exercise its "Control" over AES Chhattisgarh Energy.
