Punjab Vigilance arrests 4 in Ludhiana Improvement Trust case

Chandigarh, September 16

The Punjab Vigilance Bureau on Friday arrested four people over alleged irregularities pertaining to allotment of residential plots in Ludhiana Improvement Trust (LIT) under the locally displaced persons scheme.

“A case was registered against engineer Boota Ram; Executive Engineer Jagdev Singh; Junior Engineer, LIT Inderjeet Singh; Junior Engineer of Municipal Corporation Ludhiana,  Mandeep Singh; and Kamaldeep Singh, a resident of Model Town Extension, Ludhiana.

“In this case, Jagdev Singh, Inderjeet Singh and Mandeep Singh and Kamaldeep Singh have been arrested,” a spokesperson of the Vigilance Bureau (VB) said in a statement.

He said during investigation of an earlier case registered in July under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the IPC at VB Police Station, Economic Offences Wing, Ludhiana, it has been found that officials of LIT with alleged corrupt practices and in connivance with others had allotted residential plots to unauthorised persons under the locally displaced persons (LDP) scheme.

“Though some of the allottees had already died, their plots were reallotted by the LIT officials to unauthorised persons violating prescribed rules and took huge bribe money from the beneficiaries,” said the spokesperson.

Giving details, he said a plot in Model Town Extension, Ludhiana was allotted to a private person, Kamaldeep Singh, violating the rules.

In this case, the four officials, who have been booked, had allegedly prepared false and fabricated reports to LIT regarding non-availability of water and sewerage facilities in the said locality, according to the spokesperson.

“With an aim to favour the allottee, these officers/officials had waived a non-construction fine amounting to Rs 27 lakh without getting approval from competent authority whereas it was required to be charged from the allottee, thereby causing huge financial loss to the state exchequer,” he added.