M A I N   N E W S

Adarsh Scam
MoD to probe when Army lost ownership
Ajay Banerjee
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 1
An ongoing in-house probe by the Defence Ministry into the allegations levelled against the Mumbai-based Adarsh Housing Society, will establish “when the possession of land and its ownership actually changed hands”. According to sources, the change happened between 1996 and 2003.

The Indian Army is set to launch a Court of Inquiry (CoI) to look into ownership of land and the circumstances under which the Army relinquished it in favour of a private society. The CoI is slated to go through the list of society members and establish any “signs of conflict of interest” of the officers who are beneficiaries and their role in transferring the land. The scope of the CoI will be limited as the Army can taken action only against its serving officers and a limited action against those who retired recently.

The Ministry was studying all aspects of land ownership, alongwith the “security threat” posed by the 31-storey high building located smack on the coast in Colaba, South Mumbai. Sources said some facts relating to the ownership were yet to emerge and even suspected that files may have been tampered with, to hide the truth. It clearly indicates a “criminal conspiracy between some officials and the private promoters of the society”. It could tantamount to “breach of privilege of Parliament”, as a question relating to the land transfer was raised in 2003 in the House, said sources .

It was between 1996 and 2003 that the land ownership changed hands and files pertaining to this period were being studied. The logic is if the land did not belong to the Defence Ministry then why would a private society “oblige” so many Army and Navy officials besides functionaries of the Defence Estates Department, a civilian agency under the Ministry? Some 35 of the 103 flats are in possession of the officials from the Services the functionaries of the Estates Department.

Notably, the Deve Gowda-IK Gujral United Front government was in power between 1996 and 1998. Mulayam Singh was the Defence Minister for a considerable period. Between 1998 and 2004, the BJP-led NDA was in power. George Fernandes and Jaswant Singh handled the Defence portfolio then.

Sources said reservation of the plot was modified from Transit Camp and a Parade Ground’ to ‘Residential Zone’. Why did the Army agree to it and who was responsible for it? In 1996, the DG Infantry had inaugurated an eco-park at the same spot and the military engineering services had also built a wall around the plot now valued at more than Rs 500 crore in the open market. After the probe, a decision is expected to hand over the investigations to a civilian agency like the CBI.