Forged signs of Ambedkar, Patel in mega Guj land scam

RAJKOT: A trunk full of 400 land documents with forged signatures of none other than some of the tallest leaders of Indian Independence — Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Rajendra Prasad and BR Ambedkar — were prepared to usurp nearly half of Amreli town’s land. The documents were designed craftily to give them an ‘antique’ look by three conspirators, all senior citizens. Two of them were detained on Saturday.
The chief conspirator is Vali Metar, a 72-year-old man from Vapi, who colluded with his friends Yusuf Motiwala and Vinod Bhad. Motiwala and Bhad have been detained. The plot was unearthed after an eight-month-long investigation conducted by Amreli collector, SP and the team of directorate of forensic sciences (DFS), Gandhinagar.
“The documents matched the size and shape of the ones used in the Gaekwadi era,” said SP Nirlipt Rai. The land parcels claimed nearly 45% of the area of Amreli, said collector Ayush Oak. Metar had been staking claim to the government land since 2008 on the grounds that they were gifted to his grandfather, who, he claimed, was the administrator of Amreli during Gaekwad rule.