Thane ACB approached HC in Walkum case

Thane ACB approached HC in Walkum case
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE

October 9: The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) in Thane has filed a case (no: 34/2000) in the Bombay High Court against 32 persons including a former district collector and civic officials for their alleged involvement in the illegal transfer of a reserved industrial plot for residential use in Walkum area of Thane.

Among the accused are former Thane collector Gopal Pingulkar, former deputy collector Sudhir Meshram, former tax collection clerk with the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC), Sadashiv Purnekar, the TMC's then assistant director, town planning, Vasudev Inamdar, five partners of the H T Shah Company and four partners of Shruti Builders.

The case dates back to 1960, when H T Shah & Company bought 28,633 sq mt of land in the chemical zone at Walkum with the stated purpose of starting a petromax manufacturing unit. The government denied permission to the unit citing pollution as reason, but the company was still given a no-objection certificate conferring the right to undertake alternative development on 25,193 sq mt of this land.

However, for 27 years, the land was unused. After that, the company sold the land for Rs 10.52 lakh to Reliable Construction Company. Shruti builders then built a colony of 13 buildings on the property. Some of the flat-buyers detected irregularities amounting to Rs 2 crore in the financial transactions and complained to the ACB. Investigations by ACB Superintendent S B Zerekar revealed that there were indeed irregularities concerning the plot on which the colony stood.

A complaint was lodged with the Thane city police and permission was sought from the state government to take action against the persons involved. Permission finally came through in the last week of August.