Land scam: PMO seeks report

Sanjiv Kumar Bakshi

Hoshiarpur, August 24

The probe into the four-laning of National Highway 70 from Jalandhar to Chintpurni has taken a new turn after the whistle-blower complained that some officers were allegedly trying to mislead the investigation.

Now, the PMO has sought comments from the Superintending Engineer of the regional office of the Union Ministry of Shipping and Road Transport at Chandigarh in this regard.

The whistle-blower in the case, RTI activist Rajiv Vashisht, had filed a complaint in the PMO that the matter was not being investigated properly and the investigation was being misled by some officers. He had alleged that the complaint was about payment of compensation at exaggerated rates in Jalandhar and Hoshiarpur districts for acquisition of land for the four-laning project.

He alleged that the investigation was on for Rs 286 crore paid for 33 km in Hoshiarpur and there was no investigation being conducted for Jalandhar district’s payment of Rs 179 crore for 14 km.

Following the complaint, the PMO asked the Chief Secretary of the state government to get the complaint investigated.

The investigation was then handed over to state government’s Additional Chief Secretary NS Kalsi.

Meanwhile, CM Parkash Singh Badal had ordered vigilance inquiry into the matter and a special investigative team was formed to probe the matter.

The Additional Chief Secretary had written to the Hoshiarpur DC in this regard who had informed him that that the matter was being investigated by the Vigilance Bureau’s special investigation team (SIT) and on July 8 the SIT had taken all records in this regard.

Meanwhile, the Section Officer of the PMO had written to the Punjab Chief Secretary again and the complaint was sent to the Chief Director of the Vigilance Bureau who in turn wrote to the DIG, Vigilance Bureau, to take action on Vashisht’s complaint vide its letter dated July 22.

In reply to it, the IG (EO Wing) of the VB had informed that an investigation into matter was being conducted but it was for Hoshiarpur district only as per orders given to them.

Vashisht said knowing this through RTI, he had again sent a complaint to the PMO alleging that there were some officers trying to mislead the investigation on the name of vigilance inquiry whereas SIT’s investigation was only about Hoshiarpur and payment of Rs 179 crore paid for a stretch of 14 km in Jalandhar district had been left untouched.

Vashisht said the online status of his complaint registered in the PMO showed that the matter was handed over to Aditya Prakash, Superintending Engineer (SE) of the regional office of the Union Ministry of Shipping and Road Transport at Chandigarh on August 22.

Prakash said he had been asked to give his comments on the issue. He said he would ask the Chief Engineer of the state for highways to seek all details from the Executive Engineers concerned and send a report to him. “It is only after going through the information provided by the Chief Engineer that I can comment on it and I will be sending my comments to the higher authorities,” he added.