New Delhi: In a serious allegation, former Coal Secretary PC Parakh had made a claim that Ministers of Coal were used to issuing oral orders and wanted file notings which suited them and not the "public interest".
In a letter to the then Cabinet Secretary, BK Chaturvedi, Parakh, an accused in a CBI case related to coal block allocations, gave details of cases where he had to comply with written orders which were "against his advice" and that he considered to be "wrong".
He had been refuting allegations by the then Coal Minister Shibu Soren who wanted him transferred out of his ministry for alleged gross insubordination.
"If respect for political leadership implies complying with oral orders or recording notings that suits the Minister`s interest, as against the public interest, I am perhaps guilty of the alleged shortcomings," he had said.
Writing to the Cabinet Secretary, Parakh had stated that as a secretary to the government, it was both his right and responsibility to advice the Minister as to what he considered was "rational, fair and in the public interest".
"It is, of course, for the Minister to accept or reject such advice," he had said.
Giving a number of such instances, Parakh said, "CBI had requested for the registration of a regular case against MK Thapar, CMD, SECL under Section 120 (B) read with Section 420 of IPC and Section 13(2) read with Section 12 (1)(d) of Prevention of Corruption Act.
"After examining the material on record, the file was submitted to the PM as Minister (Coal) through MoS (C and M) with the recommendation to permit CBI to register the case.
"PM directed me to give a hearing to the officers concerned and submit a self-contained note taking all aspects of the matter into consideration," he had said.
