CM orders judicial probe into land denotification

Facing the opposition heat, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah today announced a judicial inquiry into charges of corruption in denotification of 541 acres in Arkavathy layout formed by the Bangalore Development Authority.

Siddaramaiah’s announcement came amid pandemonium in the assembly as opposition BJP trained its guns on him and continued its dharna in the House for the third day insisting on a CBI probe into the “scam” amounting to Rs 1,000 crore. “The government has already ordered a judicial inquiry into the matter and it will be headed by a retired judge,” he said.

Coming down on BJP members for demanding CBI probe, he said a “judicial inquiry would bring the truth out and some of them will get exposed. Therefore, they are afraid of judicial inquiry. If they are not at fault, they should face the probe.”

He said the denotification was as per the High Court guidelines and there was nothing illegal about it. The court warned of contempt proceedings if denotification was not done in a week.

“We had no option but to denotify the land.” Producing a document, Opposition BJP Leader Jagadish Shettar said “this has the signature of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah who approved the file pertaining to denotification of 541 acres in Arkavathy Layout. Therefore, he should immediately tender his resignation.”

Shettar alleged Siddaramaiah had lost the moral right to govern because he “lied” in the assembly that he had not signed any document pertaining to Arkavathy denotification.

“Siddaramaiah had on March 31, 2014 approved the file pertaining to the denotification. Earlier, he had told the House that he was not personally responsible and not signed the document and everything was done by the officials. But the document has proved he had lied and has made our stand clear,” he said.