Arappor files complaint against grabbing of govt land worth Rs 250 cr

CHENNAI: Arappor Iyakkam, an anti-corruption organisation, on Tuesday, filed a complaint with the DVAC over government land worth Rs 250 crore at St Thomas Mount has been grabbed by a few people and land mafia in connivance with the revenue and the registration department officials.

"Many lands in St Thomas Mount have been government lands since the British period. In October 2015, Alandur Tahsildar wrote a letter to the sub-registrar of Chennai South Sub-Division 2 in which he mentioned 36 survey numbers in Mount Village and clearly stated that all these survey numbers are government lands and no further deed registration should be done. But despite this, sub-registrars Uma, Balakrishnan, Geetha etc. have done many deeds registration, " Arappor Iyakkam convenor Jayaram Venkatesan said in the complaint.

Pointing to land opposite the DVAC office on MKN road at St Thomas Mount, he said that a company named Vedanta has given the land on lease for five years in 2019 to SBI at a rent of Rs five lakh per month.

"The scam took place literally under the watch of DVAC," he said, adding that the company had taken a Rs 5 crore loan on the land from HDFC bank in 2015.

He said that the district registrar in 2022 has cancelled the registration of government land measuring 54,605 sq ft valued at Rs 80 crore on survey no 442 following verification done by Chennai South Joint II SRO revealed forgery.

"The most shocking revelation is that the physical volumes of parent documents stored in the Sub-Registrar offices are not safe. The land mafia with the able collusion of the officials is replacing older parent documents with fake ones. This means that the land of no one in Tamil Nadu is completely safe as they can any day replace the parent documents of any person, " he said.

However, Jayaram noted that no action was taken on sub-registrar Uma. CBCID has filed an FIR in the case against Jayakumar, a private data entry and Yvonne Mary who came for registration but the sub-registrar was left out. "We demand DVAC and CBCID to take criminal action on Uma, other sub-registrars, public servants and private persons involved. IG Registration to cancel these registrations and suspend the officials involved. Revenue department should take physical possession of the properties and act against those officials who issued fake patta for survey number, " he demanded.