New Delhi: Trouble seems to be brewing for Robert Vadra, brother-in-law of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, as the Enforcement Directorate (ED) is set to question two former senior bureaucrats of the revenue department of Rajasthan government as part of its investigation into the alleged multi-crore land scam in Bikaner district.
The agency has already examined Mr Vadra in connection with the case. “Investigation by the ED has revealed that these officials played a crucial role in the allotment of agricultural land to the firm linked to Vadra”, sources said. The Central probe agency recently attached assets, worth Rs 4.62 crore, as part of its investigation into the matter. The provisionally attached assets included immovable property at Sukhdev Vihar, owned by a firm allegedly linked to Mr Vadra.
“The agency will soon call two former bureaucrats of the state administration as it is suspected that they played a crucial role in allotting land to an accused company”, sources said.
The ED had registered a criminal case in connection with the deal in 2015, taking cognisance of FIRs and charge sheets filed by the Rajasthan police after the local tehsildar of Bikaner complained about alleged forgery in the allotment of land in the area. The agency is also probing the role of a big steel firm that gave loans to a company that bought the land from firms allegedly linked to Mr Vadra for a very inflated price, sources said. However, Mr Vadra had earlier denied any wrongdoing in connection with the land deal and the Congress had claimed that the case was a result of “sheer political vendetta”.
The Rajasthan government had in January 2015 cancelled the mutation (transfer of land) of 374.44 hectares of land, after the land department claimed to have found that the allotments were made in the names of illegal private persons.
Sources said the agency suspects that a huge amount of money was laundered in this case by people buying land by producing forged documents.
The state government, while cancelling the mutations had said that these were not issued by the commissioner, Colonisation, Bikaner. The ED already attached assets worth Rs 1.18 crore of government officials and others in connection with the case under the provisions of the PMLA.
