CPI leader Gurudas Dasgupta termed the remark a "belated realisation" and "only a show".
"On one hand he defends allocations, on the other he says he is ready for questioning. He is just trying to prove his innocence," he said.
The issue came into sharp focus recently after the CBI filed an FIR, the 14th in the ongoing probe, against industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla, his company Hindalco and former coal secretary P.C. Parakh over two coal blocks in Odisha's Talabira, allocated in 2005.
