While Vyas was the Collector of Mumbai, Phatak was City Municipal Commissioner when the scam took place.
Two senior bureaucrats in the Maharashtra government were suspended on Thursday for alleged irregularities in the Adarsh housing scam including granting of membership to their close relatives and other ineligible people.
IAS officers Pradeep Vyas, who was the Collector of Mumbai, and Jairaj Phatak the City Municipal Commissioner when the scam took place, have been placed under suspension pending investigation, the state government informed the Bombay High Court.
The action follows criticism from the High Court which asked why action was not being taken against influential persons involved in the scam.
The High Court, hearing the case in which seven people have been arrested, wanted the scam-tainted Adarsh Housing Society to surrender the 31-storey building to the Defence Ministry on the ground that the structure posed a threat to sensitive defence installations nearby and said lessons had to learnt from Mumbai terror attacks.
According to CBI, Vyas (49), during his tenure as Collector from August 2002 to May 2005, allegedly connived with other accused and accepted false documents as proof of income and granted membership to those who were not eligible. His wife Seema Vyas, also an IAS officer, has a flat in the posh Adarsh building.
Vyas, a 1989 batch officer was arrested for his alleged role in the scam on Wednesday.
Phatak is alleged to have allowed the height of the building in upmarket Colaba to be raised beyond 100 metres without the approval of the High-Rise Committee of the municipal body. His son received a flat in the Adarsh Society building allegedly as quid pro quo.
The housing society, which was originally meant to be a six-storey structure to house Kargil war heroes and widows, got converted into a 31-storey building.
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