Goa court discharges former CM Digambar Kamat, 16 others in illegal mining case

A Goa court has discharged former Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Digambar Kamat and 16 others in a corruption case related to alleged irregularities in the renewal of mining leases, The Indian Express reported on Saturday.

Damodar Dhond, the counsel for Kamat and several others accused in the case, said that the verdict was pronounced on February 10, but the order copy had not yet been made available.

The allegations date back to when Kamat was the chief minister of the Congress government in Goa between 2007 and 2012. In September 2022, the former chief minister, along with seven other MLAs, resigned from the Congress and joined the BJP.

The case is based on the findings of a report submitted by a commission of inquiry headed by Justice MB Shah. The Union government had formed the commission in 2010 to investigate allegations of illegal mining in Goa and Orissa.

In its report, the commission said that the Congress government in Goa under Kamat had allegedly illegally condoned delays in applications for the renewal of mining leases in the state, The Indian Express reported. Several bureaucrats and officials of mining companies were also involved, it said.

“In 42 cases, the delay in filing renewal applications has been condoned by the state government when the applications were filed after the…

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