Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 12
Congress’ Lok Sabha MP from Gurgaon Rao Inderjit Singh today demanded a full-fledged probe into the diversion of 21,000 acres of agricultural land for commercial purposes in Gurgaon, adding that everyone involved in the process be investigated even if the list includes Robert Vadra, Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law.

Clarifying that he was not in the business of targeting Vadra, the Rao said he was interested in a probe that reveals the processes and rules that were followed to change the land use in his Lok Sabha segment.

He was responding to queries regarding IAS officer Ashok Khemka’s allegations that Vadra falsified certain documents to earn huge premiums on close to 3.75 acres in Shikhopura village in Gurgaon.

“The administration in the state has not functioned properly to find out the truth. The fact is that land was diverted and there is a feeling that it was illegally diverted and some people benefited in the process. That’s why I am for a probe into the entire diversion. ,” he told reporters outside Parliament.

He clarified that he was insisting for a probe not just in the 3.75 acre in which Vadra was involved but in the entire 21000 acres that was converted from agriculture purpose to commercial and industrial. Rao Inderjit hinted that even BJP leaders could have benefited from the said deals.

“Once an inquiry, preferably by the CBI, happens, everyone will know people from which party are involved,” the Rao said. The MP, a known baiter of Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, said around 1,200 acres of land was diverted for commercial and industrial use between 2004 and 2006.

Meanwhile, the Congress today made it clear that there was no parallel between Ashok Khemka’s case and that of Durga Shakti Nagpal in UP. Asked what it wanted to say on Rao Inderjit’s comments, Congress spokesperson Renuka Choudhary said: “The state has already conducted a probe into the issue following which Ashok Khemka was transferred. It was a general transfer and not a specific or a targeted transfer. Contrarily, the suspension of Durga Shakti is motivated and specific. In Haryana, the officer concerned was never suspended.”

About Rao Inderjit Singh’s demand for a probe into land deals in Haryana, Choudhary said: “States know how to mind their own business. Do you want us to dictate terms to the states? As for the issue of coming clean on Mr Vadra, there is nothing dirty in here for us to come clean.”

   , ,