Brazen usurpation of 150 kanals temple land
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, July 22: In a case of illegal sale of more than 150 kanals of temple land, Special Judge Anticorruption Jammu Tahir Khurshid Raina has taken serious note of investigation and returned the challan to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) with the direction for further investigation
After going through the challan, the court observed, “Investigating Officer (IO) of the case, very conveniently, has given benefit of Section 13 of the Land Alienation Act to Revenue officials and exonerated them from any criminal liability by observing that as lease is permissible to be made under Section 13 of the Act for a period of 21 years, hence no illegality is committed by the Revenue officials”.
“Even the two private persons namely Arun Kumar Gupta and Amit Gupta, who on the basis of Power of Attorneys, executed in their favour by Bawa Ram Millan Dass, sold out a major chunk of land, have not been arrayed as accused, nor the persons to whom they sold out the land and the revenue Officials, who facilitated this sham sale to take place”, the court said.
“This court is amazed to find that how much arrogance had been displayed by all these miscreants, who, inspite of clear mandate of the High Court with regard to protection of the Mandir land, with a clear directions to the accused Bawa Ram Millan Dass to simply act as its custodian, still the landed property of the temple could not be saved from its usurpation”, Special Judge Anticorruption said, adding “the wanton greed for money of these persons did not spare the temple, the place of worship, where one goes as per his faith for soul purification, satisfaction and salvation”.
“These are the aspects which, on the face of the record, speak of prima-facie serious lapses in the investigation of such a high magnitude case wherein around 150 kanals of the land of a Pracheen Mandir, namely, “Thakur Dwara Shri Ram Janki Pracheen Mandir, Udhaywala, Jammu, stand illegally sold and leased out and the temple is now left with only 13 kanals of land”, the court said, adding “unfortunately, this highly illegal and deplorable act is done by the custodians of the Mandir with the connivance of the Revenue officials, who were supposed to act as the saviours of the temple property but acted as its tormentors”.
“This has happened inspite of the fact that the High Court in its judgment dated 04-10-1989, has categorically held that the land of the temple is not the personal property of the Bawa Ram Millan Dass, who has simply to act as its custodian”, the court said, adding “the most unfortunate part is that the Investigating Officers by their sheer incompetence or on account of some reasons known to them, shielded all those who were responsible for committing this brazen usurpation and illegal occupation of the land of the Mandir”.
The court further observed, “only 4 persons stand arrayed as accused in the case, out of which two have already died whereas dozens of persons, who were the real culprits in the case have been shielded and exonerated of their criminal liability on untenable and legally unsustainable grounds”.
“This case is, in-fact, an eye opener to know as to how our so-called premier investigating agencies investigate the cases, which are entrusted with the solemn duty to expose the crime and criminals in the society”, the Special Judge remarked, adding “this court is not the post office of the prosecution to get blindly swayed by whatever bullshit they will present before the court in the name of the charge-sheet”.
Accordingly, Special Judge Anticorruption directed SSP ACB Jammu to conduct further investigation in the case and identify all the sale and lease deeds executed in respect of the Mandir land whereby about 150 kanals of the land have either been sold or leased out. “Identify all executants of these sale/lease deeds and the beneficiaries in whose favour these deeds have been executed. Besides identifying the Revenue Officials who have in any manner facilitated the registration of any such lease or sale deeds viz-a-viz by providing revenue extracts and recorded their mutations etc in the revenue records”, the court added.
“The needful shall be done within a period of two months from the date of receipt of this order and the IO of the case shall submit the status report in the investigation before this court after every ten days”, Special Judge directed.
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