SUMAN K SHRIVASTAVA
Ranchi, April 14: The raids conducted by the Enforcement Directorate on 21 locations linked to IAS officer Chhavi Ranjan and spread across three states of Jharkhand, Bihar and West Bengal have unearthed a huge land scam by a gang of scamsters having expertise in manufacturing face documents, falsifying and forging original documents is active in Ranchi.
The ED arrested seven of the gang, including revenue officials and land brokers and produced them today to the Special Court (ED), which sent them in judicial custody. The court will take a call on remanding them in ED custody tomorrow.
The arrested persons include businessman Pradeep Bagchi, Bargain Circle Inspector Bhanu Pratap, Afsar Ali, Imtiaz Khan, Talha Khan, Fayaz Khan and Mohammad Saddam.
The ED has stated that the accused persons have expertise of manufacturing fake documents, falsifying and forging original documents. They have connived with Bhanu Pratap Prasad, the Revenue Sub-Inspector who is also the custodian of the original registers.
The ED has said that it has seized voluminous property documents from the premises/possession of the above accused persons as well as from other associates which are highly incriminating.
In addition to this, forged seals/stamps bearing impressions of several offices/officials including Registrar of Assurances (Records) and very old stamps, used to manufacture the forged deeds have also been seized. Further, several digital devices have also been recovered and seized which corroborate the findings of the investigation.
The ED had registered an ECIR (equivalent to FIR) on the basis of an FIR lodged at Bariatu Police Station against Pradeep Bagchi on the basis of the complaint of Dilip Sharma, Tax Collector, Ranchi Municipal Corporation for submission of forged papers i.e., Aadhaar Bard, Electricity Bill and Possession letter for obtaining a holding number.
The ED, in its remand petition, has said that questioning of the accused persons and various witnesses has established that a huge amount of proceeds of crime is involved with a larger conspiracy to illegally sell the land by manipulation of official records and later acquiring the said land on meagre price.
“Various incriminating documents are seized during the search operation which need to be corroborated with the accused persons,” it added.
The reasons cited by the ED for getting the custody of seven persons is that they are deliberately withholding the information regarding the said land scam which they have done and other key
persons involved.
They are showing acute non-cooperation while recording their statements and being evasive in responses, it added.
“We also require their custody to ascertain the trail of proceeds of crime involved in the present case and identify the beneficiaries of the aforesaid proceeds of crime and also to ascertain the role of other alleged/suspected persons involved in the above-mentioned laundering of proceeds of crime,” it added.
Modus operandi
The ED investigation revealed that by submitting the forged documents, a holding number was obtained in the name of Pradeep Bagchi, for property at Morabadi Mouza, ward no. 21/19, Ranchi having an area of the plot measuring 455.00 decimals approx. at Ranchi.
The above property belonged to late B.M. Laxman Rao which was given to the Army and had been in the possession of the Defence, in occupation of the Army since independence. Investigation reveals that by creating a fake owner (Pradeep Bagchi) of the above said property, it was sold to one company M/s Jagatbandhu Tea Estate Pvt. Ltd.
The ED investigation further revealed that the declared government value/Market Value of the said property was Rs 20,75,84,200 whereas the said property has shown to be sold for an amount of Rs 7,00,00,000 which was highly undervalued, even compared to the declared government rate. Out of this amount of Rs 7 cores, payment amounting to Rs 25,00,000 only was made into the account of the said Pradip Bagchi and rest of the money was falsely shown to be paid through cheques to M/s Jagatbandhu Tea
Estate Pvt. Ltd. Thus, the rest of the payments have been mentioned fraudulently in order to show that the transaction and payments relating to the sale purchase of the property are genuine.
The ED’s further investigation revealed that one acre of land situated at Mauza Gari, Cheshire Home Road, PS Sadar, Ranchi is identified to have been acquired by one Bishnu Agarwal with the assistance of other persons, by way of creating forged and counterfeit documents.
In this case, it was learnt that for acquiring the above properties,
documents and records available at the Circle Office, Bargain, Ranchi along with the office of Registrar of Assurances, Kolkata, have been altered and records have been modified.
The ED had conducted raids at the Circle Office, Bargain, Ranchi
on February 9 found that the documents tampered to create fictitious owners included Register II containing sale deeds of these properties.
Similarly, the raid at the Registrar of Assurances, Kolkata, on February 15 reveals that the register containing deeds of 1932, 1948 and 1943 have been tampered to create fictitious owners of various properties in Ranchi.
The ED said that several properties have also been identified which are non-saleable government land and have been acquired by a group of persons in the same manner, besides the army land. It has been done by forging the records and creating fraudulent documents and by tampering the records available at the concerned land record authorities.
