The Enforcement Directorate on Thursday conducted multiple raids in three states including Jharkhand related to IAS officer Chhavi Ranjan in connection with a land scam case. Ranjan, a former Deputy Commissioner of Ranchi was transferred from his post after his name surfaced in an Army land scam last year. The ED raid was conducted at around 22 places in Bihar, West Bengal and Jharkhand on the premises of some private persons and government officials.
The persons whose premises were raided in connection with the fraudulent sale of Army land and other plots during the last three years also included several circle officers, circle inspectors, land brokers, Associates of Jagatbandhu Tea estate besides Chhavi Ranjan and his close relative Lovely in Jamshedpur.
The action is being undertaken under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.
Born in Jamshedpur Ranjan, has been in controversy for most of his tenure of 12 years. He is facing investigation for allegedly cutting six forest trees in 2015 at his official residence when he was DC of Koderma. He hit the hornet’s nest for leasing out stone mines in the name of Chief Minister Hemant Soren.
Though no official comments on the recoveries are available, sources said that the ED stumbled upon several incriminating documents and evidence, which may expose a huge land scam in Ranchi during around two years’ tenure of Chhavi Ranjan as DC by tampering and manufacturing land documents.
BJP legislature party leader Babulal Marandi has alleged that the scam is worth Rs 10,000 crore and Chhavi Ranjan is the main character of this land fraud.
The raids are in connection with a money laundering probe conducted by the federal agency at around two dozen locations, including his official residence, over some land deals in Ranchi in the past few years.
Several such deals, including the sale of land allegedly belonging to the Indian Army in Ranchi, are under the scanner, a senior ED official said.
Ranjan, a 2011-batch IAS officer, was the deputy commissioner of Ranchi when the deals were allegedly processed, between 15 July 2020 and 11 July 2022.
He is the second IAS officer from the Jharkhand cadre to have come under ED’s scanner in the last one year. Senior IAS officer and then mines secretary Pooja Singhal was arrested on May 11 last year on money laundering charges in connection with an alleged MNREGA scam. Around Rs 20 crore was recovered during the raids at locations linked to Singhal and her acquaintances.
Meanwhile, according to sources, the ED team is also raiding the locations of land trader Ashraf Khan and Birendra Sahu. The ED has recovered a fake seal of the Calcutta registrar’s office from Afsar Khan’s place in Ranchi. The documents received by ED also have the seal of the Kanke Zonal Officer. The agency has confiscated all the recovered documents. Sahu is alleged to have links with the Sahibganj scamsters too.