Land scam: CBI raids homes of Hooda, bureaucrats

Syed Ali Ahmed

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Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 3

The Central Bureau of Investigation today conducted searches at 24 places in Chandigarh, Haryana and Delhi, including the residences of former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, in a case of alleged irregularities in the purchase of land from Gurgaon farmers, who were “cheated” of Rs 1,500 crore.

The search operation also covered the residential premises of UPSC member Chattar Singh, who was then Additional Private Secretary to Hooda. 

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Raids were also conducted on the premises of Haryana Additional Transport Secretary SS Dhillon (then Director, Town and Country Planning); then Principal Secretary of Hooda ML Tayal (now retired); former Chief Town Planner Dhare Singh; Director of ABW Infrastructure Atul Bansal, his brother Amit Bansal; then OSDs to Hooda MS Chopra and Randhir Singh; the office of Town and Country Planning; then District Town Planner Jaswant Singh and then Deputy Superintendent of Town Planning Kulwant Singh.

CBI spokesperson RK Gaur said it had registered a case on September 15, 2015, against unidentified public servants and unknown private persons and took over the investigation on August 12, 2015, on the request of Haryana Government and further directions of the Centre. He denied involvement of Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra.

The CBI team recovered documents related to bank transactions and property in the name of relatives and two computers from Hooda’s residence; documents of a flat in  Delhi and another in Faridabad from Chattar Singh’s house; documents of four flats from Tayal’s house; four plots in  Gurgaon, Panchkula and Chandigarh and farmland in Punjab from SS Dhillon’s residence; and laptop, hard disk from Atul Bansal’s place.