By IANS
Chandigarh : Two officers of the Haryana government, including a state civil services officer, were Tuesday booked by the chief minister’s flying squad for misappropriating prime panchayat land in Gurgaon district valued at millions of rupees.
Five cases have been registered against the two officials – former sub divisional magistrate (SDM) and assistant collector of Gurgaon, Vivek Padam Singh, and district development and panchayat officer V.S. Malik.
They have been charged with corruption, cheating, forgery, misuse of authority and criminal conspiracy.
The case has been handed over to the state police and an additional commissioner of police (ACP) has been tasked to investigate the case further.
The officials have been accused of misappropriating 182 kanals (one kanal is 500 square-yards) of prime land in Badshahpur Asqaz village alone in Gurgaon district two years ago.
Hundreds of acres of other prime land were misappropriated by the officials in other villages of the district.
In one case, Malik is said to have given a decision on a prime piece of land measuring over 1,200 acres, which benefited the land mafia.
Singh misused his authority as magistrate without having powers to do so, the enquiry has found.
The officials were also found to have colluded with the village sarpanch and other revenue officials to misappropriate the land. The village panchayat was devoid of its land.
Gurgaon deputy commissioner Rakesh Gupta said that he got the matter investigated by vigilance officials after it came to his knowledge earlier this year.
“Other similar cases of misappropriation of land by these officials also came to my knowledge and were investigated. The role of these officials was confirmed in the inquiry,” Gupta said.