Madras HC pulls up official over compensation for land to fake claimants

CHENNAI: Holding that a special district revenue officer (DRO) for land acquisition has prima facie violated the orders of the HC in connection with disbursal of compensation amount for land on fake claims, the court has ordered show cause notice to the officer for initiating contempt of court proceedings.

Justice R Suresh Kumar observed the court wants the second respondent to file an affidavit to show cause, as to why contempt proceedings shall not be initiated against her under the provisions of the Contempt of Courts Act. The judge directed that the affidavit be filed by the next date of hearing, January 25.

The interim order was passed on a contempt of court petition filed by Rajendran, a local resident, praying for action against the special DRO Narmadha for violating the court orders in disbursing compensation for claims made for OSR land under the Chennai-Bengaluru national highway project at Nemili-A and Ayakolathur villages, in Sriperumbudur talkuk in Kancheepuram district.

An  amount of Rs 286.40 crore was sanctioned for compensation for land donors, of which, Rs 247.46 crore had been disbursed to the claimants.Investigations revealed Rs 20 crore was disbursed to fake claimants and the CB-CID, which has been entrusted with the probe, has so far recovered Rs 18 crore.

Compensation was disbursed on May 16, 26 and August 12, 2020 ignoring the orders of the HC, which in Feb 10, 2020, directed the DRO to deposit the entire amount as fixed deposit in a nationalised bank in the name of Registrar General of the court.Justice Suresh Kumar also rejected the submissions of the counsel for the DRO that the disbursal was made “only due to inadvertence and not intentional”.