The Aluva rural police arrested a middleman on Friday in connection with the alleged forgery of documents to convert a wetland at Choornikkara in Ernakulam district. Abu, a Kalady native, has been accused of helping the landowner forge documents to show the wetland as commercial dry land.
According to reports, the police have also taken into custody an official of the Land Revenue Commissioner’s office for helping Abu forge the documents.
According to the police, Abu was paid Rs 7 lakh by the owner of the land to forge documents. He had been absconding after the wetland conversion snowballed into a controversy. The illegal conversion came out after the village officer of Choornikkara noted the forgery.
Reports also state that Abu has told the police that he had help from officials of the Revenue Department to forge the documents. The clerk of the Land Revenue Commissioner’s office in Thiruvananthapuram was reportedly booked after this.
Officials of Aluva East police told TNM that Abu has been arrested under Indian Penal Code Sections 406 (Punishment for criminal breach of trust), 471 (Using as genuine a forged document or electronic record) and 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention).
The wetland is located at a prime location in Ernakulam, adjacent to National Highway 544 (Salem-Kochi highway). At present, it houses a godown. Owned by a Mathilakam native, the land has been in its present condition for over two decades.
TNM contacted an official from the local administration who said that the godown located on the land was authorised and given a building number sometime around the year 1994-1995. According to the official, though it does look like a dry land, the original revenue documents label it as a wetland.
“The land has been looking dry for the past several years. “Even the area adjacent to this particular land at present does not show any features of a wetland. However, older generations share that this controversial piece of land as well as the area around, including the area where a National Highway and a railway line pass through, used to all be wetlands,” an official of Choornikara panchayat told TNM.
Earlier, the inspection wing of the Land Revenue Commissioner’s office had given a preliminary investigation report to the Land Revenue Commissioner stating that the seals used in the forged documents were real. It had also stated that usage of the genuine seals cannot be possible without the help of officials, reported TOI. As per the report, two seals were used in the forged document – one of land revenue commissioner’s office and the other of senior section superintendent.