For those who came in late: the latest controversy involving Dr Manmohan Singh and his UPA government has its genesis in a March 2012 Draft CAG report on 'allocating coal blocks in an inefficient manner' during the period 2004–2009, when the coal ministry was directly under the charge of prime minister. Team Anna picked up the issue, and the otherwise reticent PM went to the extent of saying: "If it turns out that there is even an element of truth in these charges, I will give up my public career and [the] country can give me any punishment." 

As the controversy spread, after names of the recipients of coal block allocations were revealed, the case was handed over for investigation to the CBI. The CBI draft status report, submitted to the SC on March 8, pointed out that allocations were done without verifying the credentials of companies which allegedly misrepresented facts about themselves. The government vehemently refuted these findings of "arbitrary allotments without scrutiny" and claimed that the "CBI is not the final word on this"

A bench of Justices R M Lodha, J Chelameswar and Madan B Lokur, in an unprecedented move then asked CBI director Ranjit Sinha to file an affidavit affirming that its report "was vetted by him and nothing contained therein has been shared with the political executive". Attorney General (AG) Goolam Vahanvati, when asked, told the court he had not gone through the report. Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Harin Rawal went on to make an unequivocal statement that the status report had not been shared with anybody from the political executive. 

After much speculation and many denials the CBI director in his affidavit to the SC admitted that the draft of the status report had indeed been "shared with Law Minister as desired by him prior to its submission before the Supreme Court. Besides the political executive, it was also shared with one joint secretary level officer each of Prime Minister's Office and Ministry of Coal as desired by them."

As demands rose for the law minister's resignation, the PM stepped in to aggressively defend him: "There is no question of the Law Minister resigning. The matter is now in the court and it is sub-judice. It is not proper for me to do anything. But there is no question of the Law Minister resigning."

Meanwhile, the ASG blamed the AG,  corroborated the CBI claim, and said that he "felt embarrassed and was forced to take a stand in the court consistent" with that of the AG because he had already stated that the "contents of the status report were not known" to him.

And now comes the stinging indictment from the SC, asking the CBI, inter alia, "Can you tell us, is the Law Minister entitled to call for such reports? Joint Secretary Coal, Joint Secretary PMO -- can they also look into the status report? Why were details of changes, and under whose instance these changes were made, not disclosed in CBI chief's affidavit?"

The questions for the PM are piling up. One doesn't have to research too hard to name many such times in the past when the stand taken up by him does not quite square with his reputation for honesty. Here's a quick list from memory: