Serula case: ED attaches land worth Rs 3.19 crore

Panaji : Giving a new twist to the Serula comunidade land scam, the Enforcement Directorate has attached land admeasuring 7,975 sq.mts at Socorro, which is worth around Rs 3.19 crore and allegedly belongs to Socorro sarpanch Sandeep Vazarkar and other members of his family.

The ED had initiated the investigation in the case under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act on the basis of an FIR registered by Goa police against Sandeep Vazarkar, other members of the Vazarkar family and former attorney of the Serula comunidade Agnelo Lobo. 

The FIR had been filed based on the complaints lodged by members of the managing committee of the Serula comunidade.

The ED said that it issued provisional attachment order under Section 5 of the PMLA, attaching 7,975 sq.mts land situated at Socorro worth around Rs 3.19 crore that allegedly belongs to Sandeep Vazarkar and other members of the Vazarkar family.

The ED said that during the course of investigation it was revealed that Sandeep Vazarkar and his brother Shivdas Vazarkar hatched a conspiracy to fraudulently acquire the aforesaid attached property belonging to the Serula comunidade by filing a fraudulent mutation application to the Mapusa mamlatdar’s office in the name of their deceased father Arjun Vazarkar; they subsequently transferred it to their names, and other members of the Vazarkar family.

The ED probe revealed that the application for mutation was submitted in the name of a deceased person; the documents submitted along with the application were forged and the NOC issued by the former attorney of the Serula comunidade was in violation of the rules prescribed under the ‘Code of Comunidades’. 

Moreover no permission from the state government was taken, as mandated for transferring such property belonging to comunidades.