Licence of land sold by Skylight to DLF "deemed to have lapsed":Khattar

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar Thursday said the licence of a piece of land in Gurgaon's Sector 83 which was sold by Congress leader Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra's firm Skylight Hospitality to realty major DLF was "deemed to have lapsed".

The licence of the piece of land has not been renewed, he said.

"Renewal nahi kiya toh deemed lapse hai (Licence if not renewed is deemed to have lapsed)", Khattar told a press conference.

He was asked for comments on media reports that claimed the state government had in the past two years accepted nearly Rs 92 lakh from DLF to renew the commercial licence of the land in Gurgaon that was earlier owned by Skylight Hospitality.

Khattar, however, did not further elaborate on his reply.

The 3.5 acres were alleged to have been bought for Rs 7.5 crore by Vadra's company and later sold to DLF for Rs 58 crore after getting a licence to develop a colony.

Recently, a case was registered by the Gurgaon Police against Vadra and former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and some others over alleged irregularities in the land deal.

Khattar said the matter will be thoroughly investigated.

The BJP has alleged there were irregularities in land deals during the term of the previous Congress government in the state.

Asked about the "non-payment of pending dues" by an entertainment project called Kingdom of Dreams (KoD) in Gurgaon, the chief minister said a "notice was issued to the Kingdom of Dreams for payment of earlier dues. We have given time to them as they wanted to settle the dues. However, if they fail to make the outstanding payment, action would be taken accordingly."
He said the state government had taken effective steps for keeping a check on corruption in Change of Land Use (CLU) cases "which was prevailing in the previous government."