Revenue scam: Two stamp vendors held, many fear arrest

The Central Crime Branch (CCB) has arrested two stamp paper vendors for allegedly helping sub-registrars register revenue sites to private parties and manipulating the software used for property registration.

R Rangaswamy (49), a resident of Peenya, and Keshava (39), a resident of T Sadarahalli, are the arrested suspects. They both are stamp paper vendors at Laggere and Dasanapura sub-registrar offices.

A senior police officer said the duo was working as middlemen. They would help the sub-registrars in identifying agriculture land under the green zone, buying them from farmers and converting and developing them as layouts, and selling the layouts to private parties.

CCB officials questioned seven sub-registrars on Monday, and they would be summoned again for further interrogation.

It is learnt that after sub-registrars had obtained anticipatory bail, more staffers, including data entry operators, engineers and other sub-registrars, have applied for anticipatory bail fearing arrest.

It is alleged that nearly 50 government officials are involved in this scam.

A special team has been sent to Pune to gather details about the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) software.

After they return, more information would be gathered on the scam, said a senior police officer.