CHANDIGARH, May 8:
The Haryana State Vigilance Bureau has registered a case of cheating and corruption against former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and four officials who were in HUDA for allegedly realloting a plot to Associated Journals Limited (AJL) in Panchkula in 2005.
The case under various IPC sections, including criminal breach of trust by a public servant, cheating, criminal conspiracy and under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act, was registered against Hooda, the then Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) chairman, an ex-officio post held by him as the CM, and four other top officials of HUDA then, by the vigilance bureau on May 5.
The FIR was registered at the bureau’s police station in Panchkula, a bureau senior official told reporters today.
The plot had been initially allotted to AJL in 1982. After the expiry of the lease period in 1996, then Haryana Vikas Party goverment led by Bansi Lal took back its possession. It was reallotted to AJL after the Congress leader came to power in 2005.
The official said that an officer of SP rank would probe the case under the supervision of an officer of IG rank or above.
The bureau has alleged that the act by the then HUDA chairman and the officials had caused a huge financial loss to HUDA as the plot should have been sold through open auction instead of being alloted again to AJL.
An FIR had been lodged in December last year by the state vigilance bureau against Hooda as the then chairman and chief administrator of HUDA for alleged irregularities in allotment of industrial plots in Panchkula three years ago.
On the new FIR, Hooda told reporters that no rules had been violated in the allotment.
Hooda hit out at the BJP Government in Haryana alleging there was political vendetta. (PTI)
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