Front Page   

DDA officials land in CBI net

THE PLOT THICKENS: Delhi multi-crore land scam prime accused Ashok Malhotra in police custody.

NEW DELHI: Two Delhi Development Authority officials and an employee of the tainted contractor Ashok Malhotra, prime accused in the Delhi multi-crore land scam case involving fraudulent allotment of plots meant for displaced slum dwellers in Dheerpur Phase I during 2000-02, have been arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation.

In another related development, the CBI has registered a fresh case against Malhotra and six officials of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi in connection with alleged allotment of plots under the Molarband Phase II resettlement scheme in the Capital this year.

The CBI summoned R. S. Sandhu, manager of a canteen run by Malhotra at Delhi’s Old Secretariat, on Thursday for questioning on suspicion that he was also a party to the land-grab business and had arranged forged documents that were used to get the Dheerpur Phase I plots allotted fraudulently. The CBI officials arrested Sandhu late on Thursday night and produced him in a court that remanded him to 10 days’ CBI custody on Friday.

In the same case that was registered on July 24, the CBI on Friday arrested two DDA officials, Deputy Director A. K. Mishra and Assistant Director J. R. Gaur, on charges of helping Malhotra in getting the plots allotted in fictitious names.

The other DDA officials booked in the case are Deputy Director K. S. Verma (now retired), Assistant Engineer Shyam Babu and Junior Engineer S. K. Sharma.

Earlier on Thursday the CBI registered another case against Malhotra and six MCD officials posted with the Slum Upgradation and Rehabilitation Department. They have been identified as Director S. N. S. Sidhu, Deputy Director Phillip Toppo, Assistant Director Sumer Chand Garg, Upper Division Clerk Atul Vasisht, Assistant Engineer Sher Singh and Junior Engineer Nanak Chand Khandelwal.

The investigative agency carried out searches at a dozen places, including the residential and official premises of the accused MCD officials in Delhi, Ghaziabad and Gurgaon and Palwal in Haryana, on Friday. A search was also conducted at the ITO office of the MCD’s slum and jhuggi-jhonpri wing. The agency claims to have seized several incriminating documents.

The CBI also mounted a raid at the Keshavpuram residence of a builder, but he was not found there.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

UPA-Left standoff continues
Fernandes remarks cause uproar
U.S. rules out renegotiation of 123 agreement
Sky marshal arrested
Two jawans killed in landmine blast
Man who promised meeting with President arrested
Parliament cannot decide on treaty or international agreement: Somnath
Quota: judiciary can’t be an exception, says panel
‘Press should respond to new challenges’
Russia, China display their firepower
U.S. Fed steps in to check market crash
Computer tackles Rubik’s cube enigma
The Twenty20 World Cup, a bit of a lark
Baghdatis stretches Roger Federer
Lin Dan stops Anup Sridhar
Colleges offering B.Ed. need not surrender seats: High Court
City police begin enforcing helmet rule
Shift to bio-fuels a mistake: researchers
DDA officials land in CBI net
Ban on publishing transcripts in blasts case
Notification on mining in six districts stayed
YSR seeks Rs. 8,000 cr. for Telangana
Opportunities Fair from today
Political uncertainty looms over State
Eleventh Plan set in motion
Bal Thackeray fined
Technical service just a call away
Metroplus
Congress ‘alert’ to possibility of early Lok Sabha elections
ICL-State talks end in deadlock
Row over car factory land takes a turn
Panel for reviving boating service
Two insurgents held
11 more die in Bihar
Murder convict to be hospitalised

Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu