Former environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan's home raided

Chennai: The CBI on Saturday raided the residence of former UPA minister Jayanthi Natarajan in a case of alleged abuse of power as the minister of state for environment and forests in approving diversion of forest land for a mining project in Jharkhand. 

Sources said Jayanthi is abroad and is likely to return “very shortly”, when she is likely to be questioned about the 2012 episode when she, as the minister of state for environment and forests, had cleared 55.79 hectares of forest land inside the core zone of Singhbum Elephant Reserve ignoring the fact that her predecessor Jairam Ramesh had rejected the proposal.

The CBI team arrived at Jayanthi’s Alwarpet house in the morning and carried out extensive searches after restraining the inmates from leaving and also disallowing visitors from outside. Some members of Jayanthi’s family were present and appeared shaken by the development, sources said.

Jayanthi, 63, was MoS(E&F) in the Manmohan Singh during 2011-13 and quit the Congress party after launching an attack on Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. She is not with any political party at the moment.

Sources said that apart from Chennai, the CBI also conducted searches at premises in Delhi, Kolkata, Ranchi and Sundergarh (Orissa) in connection with this case. The CBI FIR names Jayanthi and also Umang Kejriwal, the then managing director of Electosteel Casting Ltd, based in Sundergarh, and has accused them of corruption and criminal conspiracy in the transfer of 55.79 hectares of land within the core zone of Singhbum Elephant Reserve of Saranda forest for iron and manganese mining by Electosteel. 

Alleged abuse of power

• The FIR has been filed against Jayanthi Natarajan, Umang Kejriwal, the then managing director of Electrosteel Casting Limited, and the company. 
• The case pertains to clearance given for diversion of forest land in Saranda Forest in Singhbhum District of Jharkhand to mining company Electrosteel in alleged violation of Forest (Conservation Act) in 2012.
• The permission was initially denied by Minister of State for Environment Jairam Ramesh but granted when Natarajan assumed office.

The CBI alleged that Jayanthi's clearance had violated the mining laws, environment laws and the directions of the Supreme Court.

Worse still, her predecessor Jairam Ramesh had firmly rejected the mining proposal and even cancelled the earlier mining approvals falling within the elephant reserve. 

Also, the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) had stuck to its guns that its earlier rejection of the proposal stood for want of any “new facts”.

Explaining in great detail how the file for mining clearance moved deftly between the Electosteel and Jayanthi despite legal and environmental hurdles, the CBI in its FIR said, “The approval had been accorded without adhering to the advice of the Director General of Forests and against the directions of the Supreme Court.”