Terming the Karnataka government’s action in sending its second report on the illegal mining during previous state governments to the Supreme Court appointed Central Empowered Committee (CEC) as “mischievous” and “factually incorrect”, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna urged Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda to withdraw the same.
In a strongly worded 10-page letter addressed to the CM dated Tuesday, copies of which were released here on Wednesday, Krishna, who served as CM during 1999-2004, expressed anguish over the government’s action in sending the supplementary report to the CEC.
Countering the state government’s observation that he had recommended 16 mining leases to the Centre, of which many were endorsed, Krishna said that not a single lease was granted as has been made out in the report. “I would like to reiterate that let alone recommending any case from the de-reserved category of mineral bearing areas, not even the preliminary hearing under rule 26(1) of Mineral Concession Rules, 1960, was taken up for consideration during my tenure as CM,” Krishna stated in the letter.
The Minister expressed surprise over the change of mind of the government in sending the second report submitted to the CEC reversing both the content and the character of its first report. “The second report contains distorted information and out of context quotations so as to deliberately suggest a wrong doing on my part as the chief minister from October 1999 to May 2004,” Krishna added.