Gujarat land scam: ED attaches realtors' plots worth Rs 5.92 crore in Bhuj

Ahmedabad, April 29 (IANS) The ED attached immovable assets worth Rs 5.92 crore, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, in connection with an illegal allotment of Gujarat government land by a bureaucrat to a private realtor, an official said on Tuesday.

The seized assets include immovable properties in the form of plots located in Bhuj, Kutch, the official said.

Retired IAS officer Pradeep Sharma was involved in the alleged land scam in collusion with Sanjay Shah, who developed the land for residential plots and generated the proceeds of crime.

Sharma, who joined the Gujarat Administrative Service in 1981, was promoted to the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) in 1999. He served as the collector of the Rajkot and Kutch districts.

An investigation by the ED showed that Sharma, in connivance with other revenue officials, was involved in cheating and illegal allotment of valuable government land by leveraging his position as the District Collector of Bhuj, Gujarat.

He disregarded various government resolutions and allotted the land illegally to Sanjay Shah, which caused a loss to the Gujarat Government, said an ED official.

The ED initiated a money laundering investigation based on the FIR registered by the CID, Crime Branch, Border Zone, Bhuj, for cheating and criminal breach of trust.

The retired bureaucrat was previously convicted under the PMLA in January in a separate case related to land allotment and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment.

The other case against Sharma involved allotment of government land in 2004 to a private company, which caused a loss to the public exchequer.

Sharma was found guilty of violating government regulations by allotting 47,173 sq. m. of land, much more than his official authority.

Investigators found that three separate land allotment applications for the same company and purpose were approved in a single day. This violated the rule which mandates consolidated decision-making.

Sharma was named in the FIR registered in 2011 and the co-accused at Rajkot CID Crime Police station under penal provisions dealing with criminal conspiracy, criminal breach of trust, and misuse of power by a public servant.

--IANS

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