Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Sunday directed Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to lodge an FIR against officials involved in anomalies in land acquisition process for Dhansar Hirak ring road in Dhanbad district.

After the direction   ACB will lodge FIR against the then revenue official Uday Kant Pathak, Narayan Vigyan Prabhakar, Vijay Kumar Singh, Shyampad Mandal, Rama-shankar Prasad, Md Jilani, the then executive engineer of road construction department Rajkumar Prasad, assistant engineer Arun Kumar Singh, junior engineer Ramesh Kumar Prasad and some other private persons.

In 2010, Jharia Rehabilitation Authority had sent a proposal to the state government for acquisition of 59.4 acres of land at Tilatand under Baghmara police station area of Dhanbad.

During acquisition process the government released Rs 20 crore to be distributed among 15 landholders. It was found that officials released payment to many beneficiaries without completing acquisition process.  

ACB will now lodge FIR against them under sections of IPC and PC Act.

In another development chief minister sanctioned prosecution against forest official Jitendra Kumar Hajara who is posted in Medininagar forest division in Palamu.

He accused to have allowed timber mafia to chop as many as 535 trees on 15 hectares of forest land. In this case the government had already conducted departmental action against the accused official, including suspension of salary increment. In the past he was suspended by the Government for embezzlement of Government money around Rs 22. 53 lakh.

 Chief minister also gave approval to Jharkhand/ Vananchal JP Andolankari Ayog to correct the list of persons identified by the Ayog who had participated in separate Jharkhand movement and JP movement. 

Notably, all such identified persons will be entitled to avail pension from the State Government. So far, the Ayog has identified as many as 19 persons who had actively participated in the movement.