Vadra forged papers to pocket premium on land deal: Ashok Khemka

Reply to panel; Khemka claims Vadra gained from sham transactions.

The land deals of Robert Vadra,son-in-law of Congress president Sonia Gandhi,returned to haunt the party after IAS officer Ashok Khemka alleged that Vadra falsified documents for 3.53 acres of land in a Gurgaon village and pocketed large premium on a commercial colony licence.

In his reply to a three-member inquiry committee set up by the Haryana government last year to look into the Vadra-DLF deal,Khemka alleged that Vadra executed a series of sham transactions for 3.53 acres in Shikhopur village of Gurgaon.

The matter pertains to a deed recording the sale of land by Onkareshwar Properties Ltd to Vadras company Sky Light Hospitality Ltd for Rs 7.5 crore and further sale of the same land by Vadras company to the DLF for Rs 58 crore.

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In October last year,while serving as Director General,Consolidation of Land Holdings,Khemka cancelled the land mutation deal between Vadra and DLF. He was shunted out of the department immediately.

Khemka,who submitted a reply running into 100-plus pages,alleged that the sale deed of February 12,2008 through which Vadras company Sky Light Hospitality bought land from Onkareshwar Properties and a letter of intent from the Department of Town and Country Planning (DTCP) granting his company a commercial licence in March 2008 were sham transactions to allow Vadra collect market premium.

No price was paid as claimed in the registered deed. The sale registered in the deed cannot,therefore,be called a sale in true sense of the term,legal or moral,and it cannot be said that Sky Light Hospitality became owner of the land in question by virtue of sale registered in the deed, Khemka stated in his reply to the inquiry committee.

The DTCP ignored rules and regulations to allow crony capitalists operating as middlemen to flourish and appropriate market premium of a licence… the DTCP aided Vadra in making these sham transactions, he alleged. The 3.5 acres of land was shown as sold under registered deed number 4928 dated February 12,2008 by Onkareshwar Pvt Ltd to Sky Light Hospitality Ltd for Rs. 7.5 crore as full consideration amount vide cheque no. 607251 dated February 9,2008 of Corporation Bank,New Delhi. All expenses,according to the deed,including stamp duty of Rs 45 lakh,were borne by Sky Light Hospitality Ltd.

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In his reply,Khemka alleged that cheque no. 607251 did not belong to Sky Light Hospitality: Most likely,a fictitious cheque number was shown by the vendee-company (Sky Light Hospitality) in the deed registered with full consent and knowledge of the vendor company (Onkareshwar Properties) so that the legal title of the land is transferred to M/s Sky Light Hospitality by virtue of a sham transaction.

Within two months,Vadra entered into an agreement to sell the land to DLF for Rs 58 crore and began receiving the money in instalments as advance,Khemka alleged. The first of these instalments came in June 2008. Payment to Onkareshwar Properties was made from the advance money received from the DLF. Vadras company began receiving money into its accounts without investing any of its own funds to buy the land, he alleged in his reply.

Procedures governing grant of colony licences and change in land use permission must be made completely transparent so that the profits or premium,on account of grant of colony licence or CLU permission,do not accrue to middlemen, he said.

I wish our institutions were more inclusive than extractive as defined in the book Why Nations Fail…, Khemka told The Sunday Express.