The Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is looking into a land scam in Jharkhand that led to the arrest and eventual release of Chief Minister Hemant Soren, has reportedly discovered that the mafia took possession of 1,800 acres of unsaleable tribal land by creating forged documents to alter the property’s status. The central agency has been notified of multiple land-grabbing accusations and has discovered ₹3,000 crore in illicit gains. The case involves the acquisition of valuable land parcels that have been marked as non-saleable under the Chota Nagpur Tenancy (CNT) Act.
This legislation aims to safeguard the land rights of marginalised and tribal communities. The theft of these parcels occurred through the use of fictitious deeds created with false identities and land records at circle offices, registrar of assurances (RoA) in Kolkata, and circle offices in Jharkhand.
An ED officer informed, “After taking action, including the arrest of high-profile individuals like Hemant Soren, several bureaucrats and middlemen, we received more such complaints of land grabbing. During the probe, we found that 1,800 acres of land were dealt with in a similar fashion by the mafia. Our team has estimated that the total proceeds of crime is Rs 3,000 crore.” He added, “We are verifying all the complaints and a further probe is underway.”
#IssWaqt | 1,800 acres of tribal land grabbed by mafia: @dir_ed on #JharkhandScam
— DD News (@DDNewslive) September 10, 2024
The federal agency has received several complaints of land grabbing and also identified proceeds of crime worth ₹3,000 crore. pic.twitter.com/CWoAD3a1z9
Hemant Soren is one of at least 25 persons who have been taken into custody thus far in the case. The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader was accused by the ED for obtaining 8.86 acres of land in Ranchi unlawfully, with an estimated value of Rs 31 crore, in a charge sheet filed in March, however, he refuted the charge. According to ED, land grabbers and their collaborators in revenue offices have been fabricating land records going back to 1932. Eleven trunks with copious property documents and seventeen original registers were found by the agency during its searches at the residence of Bhanu Pratap Prasad, one of the accused.
When Jharkhand was a part of Bihar, landed property registration was previously handled at RoA in Kolkata. This went on until 1991 when properties in Bihar and the modern-day state of Jharkhand were registered at the relevant land registration offices. Another ED official revealed, “The accused manufactured back-dated deeds of the targeted landed properties from Kolkata and kept it in original registers at RoA. Then, they obtained certified copies of those deeds and then disposed of the properties in connivance with each other. They had fake stamps/seals through which they created these fake deeds.”
