In yet another major reprieve for BSP chief Mayawati ahead of lok Sabha elections, the Uttar Pradesh lokayukta on Tuesday gave her a clean chit in the Noida farmhouse scam. The lokayukta said the rules that were purported to have been violated did not “exist”.
It is the second such clean chit to the former Chief Minister in recent times. The CBI had closed its probe against Mayawati in a disproportionate assets case in October. The decision of the Samajwadi Party Government to conduct the probe through the lokayukta has thus backfired. Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has time and again maintained that the previous BSP Government was neck deep in corruption and the former Chief Minister would go to jail for “her misdeeds.”
SP national president Mulayam Singh Yadav said he had nothing to say as the lokayukta was doing its job. The Akhilesh Yadav Government had handed over the Noida farmhouse scam to lokayukta Justice (retd) Nl Mehrotra on August 31, 2012 — five months after it came to power. The then Noida Authority chairman, Rakesh Bahadur, had raised suspicion of a scam in his probe.
In his report sent to Akhilesh Yadav on Monday, Mehrotra reportedly claimed that in the Master Plan of Noida, the farmhouse scheme was found permissible and no corruption or irregularity was found in the allotment process. He said the allegations of violation of any rule or act in the farmhouse allotment were found “baseless as the rules that were purported to have violated were not in existence”.
lokaykuta claimed that Industrial authorities like Noida were constituted for planned development of industrial area and not for earning any profit adding that in the report of the then Chairman, assessment of the alleged loss was made on the basis of land rates, which the records of accounts department do not confirm. He said that in view of the Supreme Court order regarding fixing land rate for farmhouse, there was no financial loss to the authority, therefore, “terming it as a scam was completely wrong”.
“After formation of Noida, the process of plot allotment on the basis of interview had been followed in which the selection committee had the right of using its discretion,” he said.Mehrotra said that a similar process was adopted in the allotment of 10,000 square feet farmhouse each in Noida. The lokayukta said even after notices were issued to over 146 applicants, none of those who leveled allegations of corruption against Mayawati appeared before him to present any evidence.
In such a situation, allegations against Mayawati were not proved, he pointed. The BSP, which has decided to go alone in the 2014 general elections, is sure to make the clean chit to its supremo a major poll issue and come out hard against the SP and the Government it leads in the State. The lokayukta said that in his report sent to the chief minister, he has recommended the files should be re-examined to ensure that allottees have not committed any fraud, made false statement or presented wrong facts.
He said that in case of irregularity the allotment should be reconsidered and a report be presented in three months. Mehrotra said that he has recommended to make required amendments in the discretionary powers of the selection committee in allotment, so that it could not be misused.