BENGALURU: A fake site allotment document racket run by four officials of the Bengaluru Development Authority (BDA) was busted on Friday in a joint operation launched by the Bengaluru city police and the Bengaluru Development Authority (BDA) Task Force.
The quantum of the scam is yet to be ascertained, but prima facie investigation suggested that the fake site allotment racket could be valued at around Rs 300 crore. Four BDA officials were running the racket, the police claimed.
According to a complaint, four officials from the BDA had hired a plush office on Cunningham Road, just a stone’s throw away from Bengaluru city police commissioner’s office.
According to the police, BDA’s joint secretary-3 Shive Gowda and real estate agent Indra Kumar are the prime accused in this scam. Kumar is the owner of Redhans company while the office space in which this company operated was owned by Gowda, the police said.
Apart from these two accused, three more officials were involved in the scam, Kamlamma, a tahasildar, and Sharat and Samapth, working as clerks in the BDA.
The police have recovered at least 60 fake site allotment documents valued at around Rs 100 crore, forged seals and letter heads of the BDA commissioner and a host of other materials from this premises.
It was a parallel office being run by Gowda and other BDA staffers. The BDA first carried out surveillance on these accused for a fortnight and the raid was carried out by the police after that, the police said.
It all began when the BDA commissioner, H.R. Mahdeva, received a pendrive from a whistleblower sometime back. Based on this input, the BDA commissioner reportedly had an interaction with Bengaluru city police Commissioner Kamal Pant.
An investigating team comprising the BDA Task Force and Bengaluru city police was formed which kept a close watch for more than a fortnight before conducting the raid on Friday, the police said. Further probe is underway.