Sreya Kanugula
The High Court of Punjab and Haryana asked the Special CBI court of Judge Panchkula for an adjournment on the trial proceedings of the Manesar land case till after February 24.
Justice Arvind Singh Sangwan of the High Court gave notice of motion to the Central Bureau after adopting the petition of Sudeep Singh Dhillon, a former IAS officer of Haryana.
The court order stated to let the trial proceedings be listed again on the 24th of February. Meanwhile, the trial court was directed to adjourn this land case past the date as fixed by the High Court.
The IAS officer, also the previous director of the department of town and country planning, argued in front of the court that these proccedings of acquistion were begun by the department of Industries.
He continued to state that thus, the department of town and country planning had no role to directly play in the proceedings of acquisition or the process of decision-making to drop said proceedings.
Mr Dhillon’s representative contended before the court that that the office of the chief secretary exonerated his client after a file noted on this dated January 19, 2018 stated so. This was after an examination was conducted as the prosecution sanction the CBI sought for him asked to do so.
His exoneration was in concern with any involvement in the acquisition proceedings of the Manesar land matter after nothing was proven out of the allegations made.
The departments of industries and the town and country planning had also confirmed this, the petitioner stated quoting the order given by the government.
The 2007 Congress government had dropped 600 acres of land in the Manesar case from the process of acquisition on Bhupinder Singh Hood, the previous CM’s orders.
The land was prepped to be acquired for the purpose of residential and recreational utility creation at the Industrial Model Township (IMT) of Manesar by the Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (HSIIDC).
The CBI had registered a case in the year 2015 against unknown persons/people on the Haryana BJP government’s recommendation as per the Prevention of Corruption Act and Indian Penal Code.
The agency had filed the chargesheet accusing the former CM Hooda as well as three previously employed officers of the IAS, along with others in the trial court.
The three officers accused were Mr ML Tayal, Mr Chhatar Singh and Mr SS Dhillon on the charges of deliberately dropping the proceedings of acquisition in order to lend a hand to real estate builders. Those builders were charged under the accused as well.
The Supreme Court set the previous decision of dropping these proceedings of land acquisition made by the Hooda government aside in the year 2018. And they gave the CBI direction to resolve the involvement of middlemen in this matter.
