Whistleblower IAS officer exposes land deals in Haryana, shunted 43 times

[dheerajjain]

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/asho ... 60685.html

Haryana bureaucrat Ashok Khemka - who had shot to headlines in October last year for cancelling the sale deed of a property belonging to AICC President Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra - has been transferred again. Khemka serving the Haryana government as managing director, Haryana Seeds Development Corporation Ltd (HSDCL) would now assume charge as secretary, Haryana Archives. The transfer has come into force with immediate effect.

The government did not assign any reason leading to the transfer of the officer who suffered more than 40 transfers during his career spanning 21 years. The sources however said that several decisions on postings and disciplinary action against employees of the corporation had created a major deadlock. The employees had been seeking the transfer of 47-year-old whistleblower IAS officer for a few days.

Haryana Beej Vikas Nigam Karmchari Sangh - an organization comprising employees of HSDCL - had alleged that Khemka had caused huge loss to the corporation and harassed its employees. They had demanded his transfer on Tuesday.

Om Prakash, president of the organization had alleged that Khemka had been concentrating on finding out the weaknesses of the government or its senior bureaucrats. He did not bother to improve the set to benefit HSDCL. The employees had alleged that 87,000 quintal wheat seed worth Rs.22 crore could not be sold as he neglected the responsibility. The HSDCL also suffered loss of Rs.3 crore on the account of interest, they alleged. Seeking the chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda's intervention, the employees had threatened to submit their resignation letters to the chief minister if Khemka was not transferred.

They also claimed that the bureaucrat had dismissed two employees, transferred 70, charge sheeted eight and sent notices to a dozen employees for dismissing them from services after he joined the seed corporation about six months ago.

Earlier, Khemka had sought a CBI probe into an alleged seed scam. In a letter written on February 21 to state financial commissioner (agriculture), Roshan Lal, Khemka had alleged HSDC had cleared the purchase of one lakh quintal wheat at higher than market price in November 2010. Roshan Lal had stated that the allegations were wrong.

Khemka had ordered the cancellation of the transfer 3.53 acre land in Gurgaon's Shikohpur village. The title of the land in the name of Robert Vadra's firm was changed to real estate giant DLF in the revenue records. He had issued orders on October 15, last year on the grounds that the assistant consolidation officer who had sanctioned it was not authorized to do so. Khemka was transferred out of the consolidation department on October 11. He had relinquished the charge on October 15 evening after ordering the cancellation of the mutation.

[dheerajjain]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 753560.cms

NEW DELHI: Haryana IAS officer Ashok Khemka's inquiry report into the land deal between a company owned by Robert Vadra and DLF in Gurgaon has accused Vadra's firm of forgery, falsification, and sham transactions. The offences punishable under section 82 of the Registration Act, 1908, can attract "imprisonment for a term which may extend to seven years, or with fine, or with both," the report says.

In his report to the Haryana government, Khemka has charged the Gandhi son-in-law, real estate giant DLF, and others also with violations of Indian Penal Code (IPC). He has estimates that the land licensing scam of Haryana could be as big as Rs 3.5 lakh crore in the last eight years. To reach this figure, Khemka has quoted the premium of Rs 15.78/acre earned by Vadra, and used this figure for all 21,366 acres of land given under colony licences by the state.

On February 12, 2008 Vadra's Skylight Hospitality bought 3.53 acres of land in Shikohpur, in sector 83, Gurgaon, from Onkareshwar Properties for Rs 7.5 crore, then obtained permission to build a commercial colony there. Over the next few months, Vadra transferred the land and permission for colony to DLF and made a minimum profit of Rs 42.61 crore, according to Khemka.

'Entire statutory appartus was a castle of sand'

"The series of sham transactions, starting from the registration of a deed on 12.02.2008, came to an end with the execution of a sale deed No. 1435 dated 18.09.2012 for Rs 58 crore in favour of M/s DLF Universal Ltd. The land, along with the commercial colony license, was sold for Rs 58 crore. Such transfers act as the perfect ruse or opportunity for middlemen to milk the market premium arising out of the grant of colony license," Khemka points out in his report.

Khemka, a 1991 batch IAS officer, was the director general of land records and consolidation of land holdings and inspector general of registration, Haryana, when he ordered cancellation of the mutation of the land deal between Vadra's Skylight Hospitality and DLF. Khemka was transferred by the state government, which later set up a three-member committee last October to look into his actions on the Skylight-DLF deal.

Khemka's report has now emerged in public through the detailed representation submitted by him to the state's chief secretary in response to the inquiry ordered against him.

In his report, Khemka says the capacity of Skylight Hospitality to develop a commercial colony "was nothing else other than Mr. Robert Vadra. The man became the measure of everything and the entire statutory apparatus a castle of sand." When the company was given the permission to develop a colony, its paid up capital was just Rs 100,000 with two shareholders — Vadra and his mother Maureen.

Khemka has also accused Vadra and promoters of Onkareshwar Properties, which sold the 3.53-acre plot in Shikohpur, of "wilfully committing" serious offences punishable under section 82 of the Registration Act. He says Vadra, his mother, and the directors of Onkareshwar Properties have also committed offences under sections 417, 468 and 471 of the IPC, as well as the Companies Act.

The statements in the registered deed that Rs 7.5 crore was paid by Vadra's company via Corporation Bank's cheque number 607251 dated 9.2.2008 and that the cost of stamp duty amounting to Rs 45 lakh was paid by Skylight "were patently false and constituted an offence under sections 417, 468 and 471 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 also," the Khemka report says. It was a "sham transaction," he says. "...Likely that a fictitious cheque number was shown by the company with the full consent and knowledge of DLF to enable it to get legal title of land," he adds.

Once Skylight Hospitality got the land title and letter of intent for grant of colony license, it got into a "collaboration agreement" with DLF Retail Developers on August 5, 2008 and received huge amounts as advance from DLF. As per the balance sheet of Skylight Hospitality, it received advances of Rs 25 crore from the DLF Group towards the JV and land accounts during 2008-09.

"This funding from the DLF Group was used to clear the dues of Rs 7.95 crore, ie, Rs 7.5 crore towards cost of land plus Rs 45 lakh towards stamp duty," Khemka says in his report.

"The motive of the sham transactions was to corner the huge market premium accruing on account of the commercial colony license. The modus operandi suggests that the payment to M/s Onkareshwar Properties for land and stamp duty costs amounting to Rs 7.95 crore would have been made immediately after the 5th August, 2008, the date the 'collaboration agreement' was executed by M/s Sky Light Hospitality with M/s DLF Retail Developers, so as to avoid any legal complications which the management of M/s DLF Retail Developers could have landed into with its shareholders and independent members on its Board of Directors," he adds.

Severely indicting the state's department of town and country planning, Khemka pointed out that it granted the commercial colony licence for 2.701 acres out of a total area of 3.53 acres to Skylight Hospitality within "a mere 18 days of the application".

Khemka's report has also alleged that Haryana "lost crores of revenues in the form of stamp duty due to non-registration of the collaboration agreement" between Vadra's firm and DLF, and the department has "aided and abetted the loss of crores of revenues to the state exchequer".

[dheerajjain]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 770074.cms

[s1joshi]

Praveen Kumar and his ghadiyali aansu coming out in open now ... He is one of the prime factor responsible for lack of development and open loot in region.
No surprise element in guessing why he didn't acted on even single complaint filed by GFWA {out of thousands submitted to him while he was DC}

NEW DELHI: A report filed by Haryana IAS officer Ashok Khemka claims to have detected a "glaring case of misappropriation of 734 acres of panchayat land" worth "several crores" by influential people — including the present chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda's aunt — in village Ankhir of Faridabad district, abutting the HUDA Gymkhana Club, along the Surajkund-Badkhal road.

The report adds that one of the alleged beneficiaries from the second partition of the panchayat land was "Smt Krishna Kanta, mother of Shri Praveen Kumar, IAS, who was the deputy commissioner of Faridabad at that time. Smt Krishna Kanta is reported to be the paternal aunt of the present CM."

The area referred to by Khemka's report is fast emerging as an upscale enclave of Faridabad, connected to Delhi not by the congested National Highway No. 2, but by a straight road to south Delhi, via Charmwood Village and the Tughlakabad shooting range.

When contacted, Khemka refused to discuss his report. Haryana officials, too, declined to go on record, but senior government sources insisted that Krishna Kanta was only a distant relative of chief minister Hooda. She belonged to Rohtak, the CM's home town, they added.

'Deputy commissioner should have protected rural land'

The report filed by IAS officer Ashok Khemka has alleged that "VVIPs" gained land worth crores after panchayat land was partitioned to favour a few. It says: "Sector 21 of Faridabad is part of Ankhir estate and by virtue of this partition; some VVIPs managed to corner prime specific khasra numbers worth several crores, abutting the main roads from HUDA Gymkhana Club of Sector 21 to Surajkund and Badkhal Lake."

In his report, Khemka claims that he referred the finding to the financial commissioner (revenue) Krishna Mohan, who was also one of the three members of a committee that was set up on October 19, 2012, to look into allegations against Khemka. There is no indication in Khemka's report that Mohan acted on the recommendation.

"The case was also reported to the principal secretary of the development & panchayats department so that effective steps are taken to protect the interests of the gram panchayat," Khemka says in his report.

Khemka's report points out that as deputy commissioner it was the duty of Praveen Kumar to protect the gram panchayat's interests in the partition proceedings before his subordinate revenue officer. When contacted, Kumar said there was no irregularity in the partition. He added that his mother had purchased the land in 2005 and it was not panchayat land.

[dheerajjain]

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-new ... 08797.aspx

Haryana IAS officer Ashok Khemka has charged the state government with tapping his telephones and putting his family under surveillance after he exposed improper land deals allegedly involving Robert Vadra, the son-in-law of Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

According to Khemka’s lawyer, Anupam Gupta, the officer was also threatened with “dire consequences by powerful people” in the state since last October and his family is going through a tremendous mental torture.

“Can anything be more worse for any officer in his life than what I have silently suffered for having done my duty,” Khemka told HT.
“I do my work without fear since I believe that life is in the hands of god,” he said.

Asked whether he is under any threat, Khemka referred to his 105-page response to the Haryana government on its committee report which rejected his findings on Vadra’s land deals.

“After the exposure of scams involving misappropriation of panchayat lands, the undersigned (Khemka) was subjected to untold mental pressure to psychologically break him down as punishment for the exposures,” he has written in his reply.

“The telephones are reportedly tapped and even the members of family are subjected to surveillance by the state CID sleuths. There are serious concerns of security,” Khemka has stated in the fifth chapter titled – Frequent transfers and mental torture as punishment.

Khemka’s lawyer, Anupam Gupta questioned the state government’s version that the officer had acted improperly by cancelling the mutation of Vadra’s Gurgaon land deal after he had been transferred in October last year.

“Facts are sought to be turned on their head. Khemka was called by an important person of the political executive in the state on the evening of October 8, 2012, and given a dressing down for trying to prepare a report. He was transferred that midnight,” Gupta said.

“Haryana government followed a carrot and stick policy on Khemka so that the report could be dropped. An important bureaucratic functionary offered him a suitable adjustment on October 13, in case he agreed not to proceed with the report.

Khemka declined to comment on the matter, saying he would not like to go beyond what he had stated in his reply to the state government.