CBI unearths land scam in Jharkhand

In a bigger land scam worth over Rs 1,000 crore in the temple town of Deaoigha, 826 acre government land was fraudulently sold after tampering the land records in connivance with state government officials of Deoghar

The CBI team that set up a camp office in Dumka a week ago, sent its teams on Friday to Deoghar, Dhanbad, Sahebganj and Latehar to search the residences of former and current government officials, most of them working in district record rooms and also the middlemen working for the land mafia.

According to CBI SP in Dhanbad P K Maji, the raids were conducted in 11 districts of Jharkhand and Bihar. The investigation agency (CBI) has seized several papers, which the agency claimed would help to establish the involvement of local officials in the scam.

Deputy commissioner ((DC) M R Meena had found that between 2009 and 2011, 826 acre land in Deoghar, Mohanpur, Madhupur and Karon circles of the district had been fraudulently sold after tampering with land documents with the assistance of some government officials in violation of the Santal Pargana Tenancy Act.

Within a fortnight of submission of a detailed repot of the DC to the governmental, a fire in the district treasury destroyed several important documents relating to the scam kept in record room.

Jarkhand chief minister Arjun Munda after getting the illegal transaction in August last year, ordered the state vigilance bureau for an inquiry into the scam. Later, Munda ordered for a CBI probe after knowing the magnitude of the fraud.