CBI books former oil regulator VK Sibal on graft charges

The CBI has charged VK Sibal, former director general of Hydrocarbons (DGH), and six other officials with criminal conspiracy and grant of undue favours to an unnamed private seismic exploration fir.

The CBI on Friday conducted raids at 15 places across Mumbai, New Delhi, Noida and Dehradun. Sibal’s residence in Noida has also been raided. “An FIR (charge) has been filed against him,” a source told DNA.

“It is alleged that officials of DGH had given undue favour to a private company in speculative seismic survey in lieu of personal favours obtained from representatives of a private company,” CBI spokesperson Dharini Mishra said. “It has also been alleged that in 2005, a contract was awarded to the private company for conducting seismic speculative survey on nomination basis at an exorbitant cost and this caused huge financial loss to the government.”

Sibal, who served as the DGH, which is India’s regulator of the oil and gas industry, between 2004 and 2009 is in the eye of a storm for another controversy involving Reliance Industries Ltd.

The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has alleged in a draft report that the costs for some of Reliance Industries’ exploration activities pertaining to D6 block in the Krishna-Godavari Basin was inflated.

On a day when the Sensex fell 0.44 per cent to 18,762.80, the shares of RIL fell almost 4 per cent to Rs862.15.
A newswire agency had initially connected the raids on DGH officials to the CAG draft report on RIL, but later withdrew the report. This is the first investigative action after the CAG in its report talked about cost discrepancies relating to the company’s oil and gas exploration operations.

The six officials named are DK Rawat, chief geologist; ESLL Reddy, finance and accounts manager; Savinder Gupta, chief chemist; S K Jain, advisor (geophysics); K A Murli, head of department, accounts; Anuridh Shah, advisor (contracts).
The CVC had found alleged discrepancies in different works carried out by Sibal and have recommended a CBI probe.