The Telangana unit of the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) registered a case against former Kukatpally sub-registrar Srinivasa Rao on Friday, for allegedly registering non-agricultural land as agricultural land in Qutubullapur.
This comes two days after the Hyderabad High Court directed the Telangana government to submit all relevant records surrounding the Miyapur land scam, along with action taken by it, to the bench by next week.
Stating that the move caused a revenue loss of Rs 16 crore to the state, The Hindu reported that the tainted official had also allegedly registered 48 acres of land in Kompally Village at Rs 82 lakh per acre as agricultural land.
The land should have actually been registered at Rs 5,500 per square yard, the report adds.
“This registration caused a loss of Rs 16 crore to the exchequer. Since the sub registrar registered the non agriculture land as agricultural land the ACB registered a case under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988,” an official release stated.
In the last week of May, the Hyderabad police unearthed a massive land scam, following the arrest of the Kukatpally sub-registrar, which revealed the alleged illegal transfer of several hundred acres of government land to individuals.
Sub-registrar R Srinivasa Rao, along with PS Parthasarathi and PVS Sharma, directors of two firms, were the chief accused in the scam.
The police said that Srinivasa Rao had illegally aided the transfer of land, from the state government, to Sharma and Parthasarathi, which resulted in a loss of over Rs 500 crore to the state's exchequer.
The Congress and the BJP have demanded a thorough CBI probe into the scam, claiming that the state's CID would not do a fair job.
However, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has refused to listen to the demand of opposition parties in the state.
Meanwhile, the Hyderabad High Court has asked for details like who sold the lands, who purchased them, and how much money changed hands, and asked the state to file a report by August 1.
IANS inputs