Officials from the Anti-Corruption Bureau conducted raids on multiple properties on Tuesday, owned by former Kukatpally Sub Registrar R. Srinivasa Rao, one of the chief accused in the Miyapur land scam in Hyderabad.
The raids took place across Hyderabad and Medak district, and ACB officials found enough Rao had reportedly floated four shell companies to cover up his financial transactions.
The land scam was unearthed in the last week of May, and involved the illegal transfer of several hundred acres of government land to private individuals by the Kukatpally sub-registrar.
“The searches revealed that Rao had acquired properties in his name and in the names of his family members and opened as many as 12 bank accounts in his name, his son Kanishka’s name and in the names of three shell companies. Rao deposited crores of rupees of illegally collected money into these accounts,” the Deccan Chronicle quoted a senior official as saying.
The New Indian Express reported that he invested Rs 19 crore in Hasini Power Projects, Rs 1.93 crore in North Star Homes, Rs 50 lakh in Manjeera Holdings and Rs 8.5 crore in I-Con Construction Company Pvt Ltd.
"It also came to light that Rao, his family members and the benamis were in possession of six plots worth about Rs 1.27 crore and 11 acres of land at Moosapet village worth Rs 11.52 lakh. The total value of the assets unearthed so far is about Rs 14 crore,” the TNIE report quotes ACB director-general J Purnachander Rao as saying.
Meanwhile, addressing the media, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao refused to listen to the demands of opposition parties in the state who have been demanding a CBI probe into the scam.
He also claimed that not one-rupee or one square yard of land was reported as losses to the government.
“Registrations of fixed assets should be registered in register number 1, whereas irregular registrations were reported in register number 4 where only movable assets will be listed. If all private citizens want ownership, they would have to pay Rs 415 crore as registration fee whereas they paid only Rs 60 lakh. This clarifies that there was no change of ownership of government land," he was quoted as saying.
Last week, Opposition leaders had alleged that 50 acres of lands were purchased by TRS MP Keshav Rao's daughter and daughter-in-law at Ibrahimpatnam, allegedly from 'Goldstone' Prasad, who is one of the main suspects in the case.
The Congress and the BJP demanded a thorough CBI probe into the scam, claiming that the state's CID would not do a fair job.