The Hindu : New Delhi News : CBI digs deeper into Delhi multi-crore land scam

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Wednesday, Aug 08, 2007
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New Delhi

CBI digs deeper into Delhi multi-crore land scam

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation has served notices on one retired and four serving officials of the Delhi Development Authority asking them to produce themselves for questioning in connection with the Delhi multi-crore land scam case in which they have been booked along with prime accused Ashok Malhotra. Malhotra’s interrogation began on Tuesday afternoon after a Tis Hazari court here remanded him to CBI custody for 14 days.

Initially the CBI will quiz Malhotra and the accused DDA officials -- Deputy Director A. K. Mishra, Assistant Director J. R. Gaur, Assistant Engineer Shyam Babu, Junior Engineer S. K. Sharma and K. S. Verma (now retired) -- separately before they are confronted with each other.

The CBI might even subject Malhotra to a lie detector test as he has not been very forthcoming so far. Apart from investigating involvement of the DDA officials, the CBI will also try to find out whether any more public servants, including politicians if any, and others were part of the colossal slum land racket. The accused will be confronted with the documents seized by the CBI from their residential premises and offices and will be asked to explain their position.

The papers pertaining to the plots seized during the CBI raids will also be produced before them.

Seventeen cars belonging to Malhotra have been seized and kept at the CBI headquarters as case property. The agency will try to find out from Malhotra the source of money with which those vehicles were purchased. It suspects that the money for purchase of the cars came from funds generated by disposal of the plots of slum land that were fraudulently allotted under the resettlement scheme during 2000-02.

The CBI on Tuesday seized from offices of the DDA and the MCD several files related to allotments of plots under the resettlement scheme.

In view of the recovery of a large number of “forged” ration cards, the CBI will shortly contact the Food and Civil Supplies Department to find out if the documents were issued from there on the basis of fake documents or were forged by the accused using fake signatures and seals of government officials.

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