ED provisionally attaches two land parcels worth Rs 74 crores in Ranchi land scam case

New Delhi [India], June 12 : The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) has provisionally attached two land parcels worth Rs 74.39 Crore in the Ranchi land scam case, an official statement said on Monday.

"One land parcel has an area of 4.55 acres in Bariatu, Ranchi, with a commercial value of Rs 41.51 Crore and another one is having an area of 7.16 acres in Bajra, Ranchi, with a commercial value of Rs 32.87 Crore. These land parcels have been mutated fraudulently in favour of land mafias in connivance with the officers of the Land Revenue Department. The first land parcel was earlier in the name of the Army," the press release said.

ED said that had initiated a money laundering investigation on the basis of an FIR registered by the Bariatu Police Station, Ranchi under various sections of IPC against Pradip Bagchi based on a complaint of Ranchi Municipal Corporation.

According to the official statement, " The investigation revealed that a racket of the land mafia is active in Jharkhand who use to forge the legacy records in Kolkata and Ranchi. Subsequently, on the basis of forged land records, such land parcels are sold to other persons."

ED had carried out 41 searches and 5 surveys in this matter and incriminating evidence like forged seals of the land-revenue department, forged land deeds, records of distribution of Proceeds of Crime among them, photographs doing forgery, evidence of giving bribes to Government officials etc were seized, the statement said.

In this case, 10 accused namely Pradip Bagchi, Afshar Ali ( Employee of RIMS), Saddam Hussain, Imtiaz Ahmed, Talha Khan, Faiyaaz Khan, Bhanu Pratap Prasad, Chhavi Ranjan ( Ex DC Ranchi), Dilip Kumar Ghosh and Amit Kumar Agarwal have been arrested and all of them are in Judicial custody, the statement mentioned.

ED said that it had shared evidence against Bhanu Pratap Prasad (an Employee of the Land -Revenue Department) with Jharkhand Government under section 66(2) of PMLA and on the basis of the same, Ranchi Police has registered FIR against Bhanu Pratap Prasad under various sections of IPC. ED has also shared evidence of forged seals recovered from the residential premise of Faiyaz Khan, under PMLA.

According to the official statement, ED has also obtained orders from the Special PMLA Court for sending the original records of the Registrar of Assurance, Kolkata and Land-Revenue Department of Ranchi to the Directorate of Forensic Science, Gandhinagar. Forensic Examination of these records proved the forgery of the records.

Based on the evidence collected by ED, Registrar of Assurance, Kolkata filed an FIR in Hare Street Police Station, Kolkata under sections 120B, 465, 467,468 and 471 of IPC and the same has been merged in this case for a comprehensive investigation.

ED said that it has filed a prosecution complaint on Monday in this case.

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