Minister among 33 accused in land grab case
Bihar police have registered a case against 33 persons, including Union minister for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSES) Giriraj Singh for allegedly “grabbing his 2.56 acres of land in Danapur sub-division” of the state capital.
The FIR was registered with the Danapur police station last week on a directive from the special SC/ST court of the additional district judge, Patna.
The case came to light after his political rivals made it public on Thursday.
The court direction came following a complaint lodged by a resident of Asopur village in Danapur police station area, Ram Narayan Prasad, 68, with the SC/ST special court. In his FIR lodged on September 13, 2017, Prasad had alleged that in all, 33 persons, including Singh, a BJP MP from Nawada, had conspired to grab over 2.56 acres of land for sale.
Others named in the FIR include few government officials from the Danapur circle office, Shiv Ranjan, Madan Kumar Sinha, Kumar Kundan Lal, circle inspector Anuj Kumar, halka karmchari Suresh Prasad, Chandrika Prasad and Manoj Kumar.
They have been named for allegedly trying to grab land under a “well planned conspiracy”. According to the plaintiff , at least five beneficiaries of the illegal land deal have died since.
The complainant said that the land belonged to his maternal grandfather but his maternal uncle, who did not have any issue, gifted it to his mother in 1948.
“Later, the land exchanged hands through sale in connivance with some government officials. One of those who bought the land was Giriraj Singh,” said the complainant, apprehending a threat to his life.
Singh, in a tweet, reacted to the accusation, stating that he had nothing to say on the merit of the FIR. “Got the information about the FIR from Tejaswi’s (Bihar
PATNA:
leader of opposition) tweet. It seems he is the architect behind the fiasco. I have nothing to say on the merit of the FIR, but will always cooperate with law.”
Earlier in the day, Tejaswi Yadav , son of RJD chief Lalu Prasad, had attacked Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar for having allegedly aligned with corrupt politicians.
In a tweet soon after the FIR was registered, Yadav reminded the chief minister that Giriraj happens to be the same minister from whose house crores of unaccounted cash was seized soon after he assumed charged as a minister in the Narendra Modi government in the Centre.
“Its a sham that Giriraj is considered an honest person despite recovery of unaccounted wealth from his house,” another Tejashwi tweet read.
The Lalu scion further questioned Nitish for his silence. “Now that a leader belonging to your alliance partner BJP has been booked in land grabbing case, will you break the coalition with the BJP?”
He wondered whether Nitish would now resign from his post listening to his conscience. "Where has chief minister's ethics gone and why is he not speaking on the issue of Giriraj Singh,”tweeted the RJD leader.
Tejashwi also lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi by saying that on one hand, the Modi government talked about honesty, while on the other hand, his ministers were capturing land instead of providing them to the poor.