India police drop corruption case against top industrialist

India's top police agency has dropped a corruption case against leading industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla, who had been accused conspiring to obtain a coal block at a cut-rate price nearly a decade ago.

The case filed last October against Birla, viewed in India's sometimes murky corporate world as a by-the-book player, had sent shock waves through business community at the time.

The Central Bureau of Investigation said late Friday in a statement evidence "did not substantiate the allegations" of criminal conspiracy.

"There was no evidence of criminal conspiracy," the agency said.

The case stemmed from the 2005 awarding of a coal block to Hindalco Industries, one of Asia's biggest primary aluminium producers and part of the Aditya Birla conglomerate headed by Birla.