Adarsh scam: Land sought only for defence housing, says Mumbai collector

Mumbai collector Chandrashekhar Oak on Tuesday told the two-member commission set up to probe the Adarsh housing society scam that the three letters sent by Adarsh to the chief minister mention that the land in question was required for the residence of the staff members of defence personnel.

The letters dated September 21, 1999; February 22, 2000, and March 8, 2000, have the same subject: “Allotment of government land to Adarsh CHS for the welfare of serving and retired personnel of defence services”. 

During the cross-examination conducted by senior counsel AJ Rana and advocate Aniket Nikam for the ministry of defence (MoD), Oak said that the collector’s office also understood that the land in question was required for the residence of staff members of defence personnel.

When it was brought to Oak’s notice that these letters were dated before or in 2000, and asked whether he was aware of any correspondence seeking change of the ‘defence service personnel’ clause, he said he did not know if the society had written any letter to the government between 2000 and 2004 informing that the land was not required ‘only’ for the residence of defence personnel.

The MoD counsel on Tuesday presented a number of letters to the commission which mention that the land was in possession of the army. Oak concurred with this stand and added that there was a compound wall around the land marking it as army property.

However, Oak also pointed out that the possession is unauthorised, and the then-collector, Devashish Chakraborty, in a letter dated May 12, 2000, had informed the government about the unauthorised possession by defence and had requested it to take appropriate action.

Referring to the deletion of the word ‘possession’ from the government resolution dated July 29, 2004, the MoD counsel argued that it was odd on the government’s part to delete the word in spite of being aware of the land’s status.