2 officers booked for allowing building construction on temple land in Jammu

An ex-commissioner of the Jammu Municipal Corporation and a former senior town planner of the civic body were booked Saturday by the Anti Corruption Bureau for giving permission to build to a residential-cum-commercial complex on temple land, officials said Sunday.

The ACB registered the case against former JMC commissioner Kiran Kumar and the then senior town planner of JMC Farzana Naqashbandi, who is now posted in the Srinagar Development Authority (SDA).

They have been booked for criminal misconduct and abuse of official position for issuing building permission in favour of two persons namely Pardeep Kumar and Kuldeep Kumar, the officials said.

This is a third ACB case against Farzana, who was earlier booked by the agency in 2015 and 2016. She continues to work as the chief town planner of the SDA despite three corruption cases against her.

A verification was conducted into the allegations that building permission was granted to the two persons for a residential as well as commercial structure at Gummat Chowk Jammu, illegally and against the laid down procedure of Municipal Corporation Jammu, they added.

Farzana recommended the case of the applicant to Kumar, who approved the proposal without referring it to agencies concerned and also ignoring objections raised by Assistant Commissioner Revenue (ACR) Jammu and Assistant Commissioner Nazool, they said.

During verification, it also came to fore that land in question was a state property acquired by Rani Blori temple during the rule of Maharaja but the officers relied upon the notarised lease deed which contained cuttings and unclear land specifications, they said.

The permission was granted in favour of the beneficiaries, thereby conferring huge pecuniary advantage upon them as the permission facilitated them to raise a huge commercial structure at the prime location, they said