Adarsh on state land,not a security threat: Collector

Oak is the sixth witness to be questioned by the commission. Other prominent witnesses are Brigadier Deepak Saxena,Defence Estate Officer Gita Kashyap Perti and Chief Secretary Ratnakar Gaikwad.

The deposition of the collector is significant since three former chief ministers—Ashok Chavan,Vilasrao Deshmukh and Sushilkumar Shinde— in the previous hearings put a large share of the blame on the collector. They stated in their affidavits that it is the collector’s office that makes decisions on land allotments,scrutiny of membership forms and such other functions.

The collector also said the slums behind the Adarsh society are a demarcation between defence land and civilian land. “Some parts of the slum are in civilian land while other parts are in defence area,” Oak said during his cross-examination.

The dispute between the state government and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) over the ownership of land on which the Adarsh building stands is a major bone of contention in the controversy.

Oak will now appear before the panel on Monday.