SIT awaits fresh govt order to resume investigation into Vizag land scam

VISAKHAPATNAM: The probe into the Vizag land scam by the Special Investigation Team (SIT), formed by the State government, has come to a standstill. The extension given to the SIT by the government ended in May and further probe will resume only after fresh orders are issued for it’s extension.  The SIT’s term ended on January 31 after it received over 1,300 grievances from people.

The government formed the SIT comprising ex-IAS officers Vijay Kumar and YV Anuradha and retired judge T Bhaskara Rao in October 2019. The SIT was asked to probe all cases of change of classification of government land in revenue records, all cases of assignments made to ex-servicemen or political sufferers where NOCs were given for the land sale based on fraudulent certificates, public land grabbed by private individuals and government land encroached by tampering land records.

However, despite several complaints, the SIT could not complete its probe within the stipulated time—January 31. Then, the SIT had submitted a 150-page interim report to the Chief Minister and sought time to complete its probe and the government extended its tenure by three more months. 

The SIT chief included three more members—retired IAS officer of Chhattisgarh K Durgananda Prasada Rao, ex-CP RK Meena and CCF Rahul Pandey—to complete the probe within deadline. 

The SIT has reportedly gone through 400 petitions and nearly 1,000 more are pending. All the records and documents received by the SIT are stored in the Irrigation Department Guest House, where the SIT office is located.