Land grab case: Bangalore Rural Deputy Commissioner, 3 others extended granted bail

The Lokayukta Court on Saturday granted bail to Bangalore Rural District Deputy Commissioner MK Ayappa and three other officials arrested in connection with a private complaint alleging illegal acquisition of government land through forged revenue documents.

Judge NK Sudhindra Rao granted bail to all the accused on a personal bond of Rs5 lakh and two sureties of the like sum each.

Imposing certain conditions, the court directed the accused to cooperate with the investigation, not to tamper with the evidence including revenue records, not to threaten prosecution witnesses and not to leave the country without prior permission of the court.

The court said the role of BJP MLA from Yelahanka SR Vishwanath, one of the accused, "has been confirmed in the case".

The accused were arrested by the Lokayukta police on March 13 and were in judicial custody. Besides Ayappa, the other three accused are: K Gopalaswamy, Special Tahsildar, Bangalore North Additional Taluk Yelahanka, N Balakrishnamurthy, Revenue Inspector Hesaraghatta Hobli, Bangalore North Additional Taluk and KV Ravikumar, Sub-Resgistrar, Hesaraghatta Sub-Registrar's office, Bangalore.

On a private complaint filed before the Lokayukta court by a farmer P Anil Kumar and two others hailing from Maddapanahalli village on last year, the court had ordered probe on November 5, 2012.

Based on this, a criminal case was registered in Bangalore city Lokayukta Police station for the offences punishable under the relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1988 and IPC.

During the probe, allegations of fabrication of documents, misuse of official power in order to transfer of Khatha of 32 acres of government land in Maddapanahalli village, Bangalore North Taluk in the name of one Narasimhaiah and its subsequent sale to other accused for a sum of Rs7 crore were prima facie proved against the accused, according to Lok ayukta police.

The 11 others accused in the complaint filed on October 9, 2012, include BJP MLA from Yelahanka assembly constituency S R Vishwanath.