Mulayam orders probe into LDA scam

Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav today ordered a high-level inquiry into allegations of a multi-crore land scam in the Lucknow Development...

Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav today ordered a high-level inquiry into allegations of a multi-crore land scam in the Lucknow Development Authority LDA. Five PCS officers and eight LDA employees are under the scanner following charges of allotting the same plots to several owners in the Jankipuram housing scheme. The probe will be conducted by Housing Secretary Rajeev Kumar, who has been told to complete it in a week.

According to reports, the officials illegally registered the same plots under multiple owners. The LDA administration has sought an independent inquiry from the government to probe what they believe is just the tip of the iceberg.

Though the LDA administration is yet to ascertain the exact amount of financial irregularities, they believe it would be somewhere around Rs 2-2.5 crore. 8216;8216;The accused replicated the original payment challans of genuine allotees,8217;8217; said an LDA official. 8216;8216;As per our information, more than 120 plots in Janakipuram have been registered under multiple owners.8217;8217;

Preliminary investigations by the LDA revealed names of 14 employees, including some senior officials. 8216;8216;However, none of them is with LDA at present as they have all been transferred out,8217;8217; said an official.

The scam came to light when some people approached LDA officials for mutation of residential plots under the Jankipuram scheme. To their surprise, they found that LDA did not have any registration documents related to their plots. When the concerned people reported the matter to higher officials, it was found that some LDA employees had illegally registered some plots to several owners. It was also found that the deposition slips for land registration had been tampered with.

This is not the first time that there have been such corruption charges against the LDA. Recently, financial irregularities were reported in allotment of residential plots in Gomti Nagar too. The matter was referred to Court and is now sub-judice. Meanwhile, in a related development, Mulayam also suspended one IAS and three senior PCS officers for irregularities during their tenure with the Gorakhpur Development Authority GDA. The suspended officials include former GDA vice-chairman Satyendra Nath Mishra and IAS official Ram Sajeevan who had been suspended earlier.

Announcing this during an official function, the CM said: 8216;8216;Under the pretext of carrying out various development work in Gorakhpur, these officials minted money.8217;8217;