CBI files chargesheet against 3 former TCP dept officials in Gurugram land release case

Bhartesh Singh Thakur  
Tribune News Service  
Chandigarh, January 4  

The CBI filed chargesheet against three former Haryana government officials and two firms on Monday before CBI Special Court in Panchkula in a Gurugram land release case

The investigating agency has chargesheeted former Chief Town Planner Jagbir Singh Redhu; former Assistant Town Planner Satish Kumar Arora and former Deputy Superintendent Rajbir Singh of Town and Country Planning (TCP) Department and two firms, M/s Commander Realtors and M/s Bharma City Private Limited for cheating, forgery, criminal conspiracy under the Indian Penal Code and Prevention of Corruption Act.

The officials have been accused of making back references to colonisers for rectifying deficiencies in their applications for licences without the approval of Director TCP Department.

The CBI FIR though had mentioned former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, ACS Power Trilok Chand Gupta and 13 firms as accused, but so far charges have not been pressed against them. The investigation is still going on in the case and more chargesheets could be filed.

According to the CBI FIR, in the name of creating land bank for Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), many of the pockets sandwitched between land on which licenses were applied, land falling under revenue rasta, nallah were proposed for acquisition in Gurugram.

The notification under section 4 of Land Acquisition Act was issued on June 2, 2009, for acquisition of 1,417.07 acre of land situated at sectors 58 to 63 and 65 to 67 of Gurugram as part of criminal conspiracy. It compelled the landowners to sell their land to colonisers at lower price than the price prevalent before the notification.

The notification under Section 6 of the Act, dated May 31, 2010, comprised only 850.10 acre of land. Finally, the award was issued for only 85.95 acre of land, on the ground that the notified land was not worth acquisition because these areas were scattered in 153 pockets and these were of the sizes of few marlas to few acres and utilisation of such pockets having irregular shape would be difficult.

The FIR adds that the acquisition was not done on one or the other pretext and release of land to the coloniser companies were wholly malafide, taken with a view to benefit private firms.

It has been alleged that there were number of deficiencies in the licence applications related to title of land, defective layout, absence of scrutiny fee, General Power of Attorneys, ante-dated collaboration agreements. Inspite of that, the files were processed expeditiously and licenses were granted.

The land was released in Nangli Umarpur, Ghata, Tigra, Ulahwas, Kadarpur, Maidwas, Badshahpur and Bahrampur (Sectors 58 to 63 and 65 to 67) villages of Gurugram.

On November 1, 2017, the Supreme Court had directed the CBI to investigate the case.

The next date in the case is January 18.