The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has expanded the scope of its investigation into the Transferable Development Rights (TDR) scam that it recently uncovered.
As part of the investigation, the ACB, over the last week, raided officials, middlemen, and realtors in connection with “fraudulently” issuing TDR to widen a road linking T.C. Palya and Outer Ring Road. “These raids, the last of which were carried out on Saturday, have now uncovered a larger scam,” said a senior ACB official.
“We have now recovered at least 20 Development Rights Certificates (DRC) of various cases across Mahadevapura and Yelahanka, which we believe are similarly fraudulent. The value of these 20 DRCs was around ₹600 crore,” the official said.
These DRCs were mainly recovered from the residences of two middlemen and a real estate firm that had allegedly defrauded the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike in the first case, with which the ACB began its probe. “A review of these 20 DRCs indicates that several methods were used to defraud the civic body and take TDR disproportionate to the property surrendered for a project. Though the probe began with Mahadevapura zone, a few instances of similar cases in Byatarayanapura Assembly segment in Yelahanka zone have also come to light. All the 20 cases pertain to the period 2013–15,” said an official.
The team has allegedly recovered documents showing how TDR was given to private individuals for government land. The overestimation of built-up area to calculate TDR where no building existed and inclusion of roads and common areas to calculate TDR were the other alleged methods used to perpetuate the fraud. In several cases, TDR was given to past owners of the property, thereby deceiving the present landlords. This meant that the actual owners have not given up property for development, thereby creating roadblocks for civic projects, said an official.