Taking a serious note of land sharks managing to get prime government lands transferred to them with the help of fabricated documents, in collusion with officials, Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Monday announced the constitution of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to verify the authenticity of documents in recent cases of transfer of government lands to individuals.
“Criminal cases will be booked against those who have got government land transferred to their names and officials if the documents are found to be not genuine,” the Chief Minister told the Legislative Assembly, while responding to the menace of land sharks raised by JD (S) member A.T. Ramaswamy. Among others, the SIT would comprise Principal Secretary to the Revenue Department.
Powers of ACs and DCs
Also, referring to the allegations that the sub-divisional Assistant Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners were misusing the quasi-judicial powers granted to them to decide on the applications seeking transfer of government lands to individuals under various schemes, he said the government would rethink on vesting such powers with them. “We will take a call on whether these officials should continue to have quasi-judicial powers with some checks and balances or whether such powers should be vested with higher officials,” he said.
Also, accountability would be fixed among revenue officials in cases where government land has been fraudulently transferred to individuals, he said. “We will fix accountability right from village accountant who is the grassroot level official to the deputy commissioner who is at the top of the chart, by their names,” Mr. Bommai said.
ACB probe
The CM also announced a probe by the Anti-Corruption Bureau into the episode of an assistant commissioner in Bengaluru fraudulently transferring government lands worth more than Rs.1,000 crore into the names of individuals through forged and unverified documents in Bengaluru.
Mr. Bommai further said that the assistant commissioner in the dock, K. Ranganath, who worked in Bengaluru North, will be kept under suspension.
Earlier, JD(S) MLA A.T. Ramaswamy, who previously headed a legislature committee that looked into encroachment of government lands in and around Bengaluru, alleged that the Assistant Commissioner worked in Bengaluru North for three months from March to June in 2020 had colluding with land sharks. Though the official worked for only 41 days in this place, as there was a lockdown on account of COVID-19, he had held hearings on 1,592 cases related to transfer of government land, Mr. Ramaswamy pointed out.
The then Principal Secretary to the Revenue Department Manjunath Prasad had taken up a suo motu inquiry into this and recommended to the Chief Secretary to take strict action against him, he said.
Mr. Ramaswamy said the value of government land in and around Bengaluru transferred fraudulently to land sharks was estimated to be around Rs.5 lakh crore.
