Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Sept 18: Special Judge Anti-Corruption Jammu Y P Bourney has denied bail in anticipation of arrest to the then Assistant Custodian (Tehsildar) Samba Omkar Saini in a land scam.
A team of Anti-Corruption Bureau had on August 27, 2020 conducted searches in the premises of Omkar Saini after it came to the fore that pursuant to a well-knit criminal conspiracy, a valuable parcel of evacuee land measuring 20 kanals that too under the occupation of two tillers was retrieved by the revenue officials on the basis of a fake and forged order attributed to the then Provincial Rehabilitation Officer Jammu and allotted to one Jodh Singh, a PoK refugee for agricultural purposes but a land broker Kul Bhushan Gupta had already taken the power of attorney.
As per the ACB, the dispatch number of the so-called allotment order actually pertains to the dispatch of some stay order on an application titled Karan Singh Versus Joginder Singh and others. The accused/applicant was Assistant Custodian (Tehsildar) Samba at that time.
The property broker made use of authority given under the power of attorney by executing five sale-deeds of four kanals of land each in quick succession.
After hearing counsel for the applicant and Additional Public Prosecutor, the Special Judge Anti-Corruption observed, “the case in hand is a very disturbing picture of abuse of official position for grabbing the state land by none other than the officials who were supposed to protect the same”, adding “there are serious allegations against the applicant of having indulged in abuse of his official position and the investigation is at the inception and arming the applicant with bail order particularly in anticipation of arrest at this stage would have serious repercussions on free fair and complete investigation in the matter”.
“Last but not the least granting bail to accused of such organized crime of sheer abuse of public offence for personal gains defrauding thereby the very state which employed them would only encourage such like-minded persons which would be highly detrimental to the state and no civilized society can tolerate such gross indiscipline in public life”, the court said while denying the anticipatory bail.
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