Haryana government chargesheets Khemka

Senior IAS officer Ashok Khemka has been chargesheeted by the Haryana government for cancelling the mutation of the Rs.58 crore land deal between Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra and realty giant DLF.

The cancellation of the land deal's mutation was done last October.

Khemka was served the chargesheet at his official residence here Wednesday night, while he was away in New Delhi.

Khemka has been charged by the Bhupinder Singh Hooda government of "exceeding his jurisdiction" while cancelling the land deal between Vadra's company, Skylight Hospitality, and DLF.

The charge sheet is understood to have mentioned the clean chit given to the land deal by a committee which was formed by the Haryana government last year to probe the orders of Khemka in the wake of his decision to cancel the mutation of the land.

The committee had held that there was no undervaluation of land for payment of stamp duty on land registration as alleged and had put the IAS officer in the dock for acting beyond the authority vested in him.

Vadra's Sky Light Hospitality had entered into the sale agreement with DLF for the sale of the land.

The probe panel had cleared the Rs 58 crore land deal, saying the factual position was different from the stand taken by Khemka, who as Director General Consolidation of Holdings and Land Records-cum-Inspector General of Registration had ruled against Vadra.

Khemka, a day after his transfer on October 12, last year and three days before he actually relinquished charge, had asked Deputy Commissioners of four districts of Gurgaon, Palwal, Faridabad and Mewat falling in NCR to "inspect all documents registered from 2005 on behalf of Vadra or his companies in the capacity of vendor (seller) and vendee (buyer)."
The panel had stated that there was no bungling in the land deals.

The committee's report had said that Khemka had applied his powers based on the Punjab Land Revenue Act, 1883, under which he had no authority to act.

The committee had gone in depth into the issue by probing the whole gamut of aspects, including sale and purchase of properties, grant of letter of intent/licence, change of land use and undervaluation of properties.

The Deputy Commissioners of Gurgaon, Faridabad, Palwal and Mewat had inspected all documents registered in their respective districts from January 1, 2005 till October 2012 by or on behalf of Vadra or his companies in the capacity of either vendor or vendee and had certified that no deed had been found registered as undervalued, a statement earlier issued by the state government had said.