Supreme Court of India Posthumously Clears Manmohan Singh in Coal Case

The Supreme Court of India on July 29, 2026, granted a posthumous clean chit to former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, closing a long-running criminal case concerning the 2005 allocation of the Talabira-II coal block in Odisha to Hindalco Industries. A three-judge bench, led by Chief Justice Surya Kant, set aside a 2015 summoning order from a special court, ruling that the trial judge had no compelling reasons to reject the closure reports filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

The original case alleged criminal conspiracy and breach of trust, suggesting Singh made a conscious effort to accommodate Hindalco, an Aditya Birla Group company, in a joint venture with public sector undertakings. The CBI had previously cleared Singh and other accused parties, including industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla and former coal secretary P C Parakh, through its closure reports.

Although the court noted that the appeal could have been dismissed as infructuous following Singh's death on December 26, 2024, the bench chose to resolve the matter on its merits. This decision was made specifically to remove the adverse observations and critical remarks made by the trial court, effectively expunging the record against the late leader.