Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is under fire for the alleged MUDA scam. Now Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot has given permission to file a case against him. The entire matter is related to 3.16 acres of land. In such a situation, it is important to know where this land is and why questions are being raised about it.
Mysore Urban Development Authority is called MUDA in short form. This authority is an autonomous body for the development works of Mysore city. The work of acquisition and allotment of land is the responsibility of the authority. Actually, Siddaramaiah’s wife Parvati had three acres and 16 guntas of land in Kesara village of Mysore district. It is said that this land was gifted to her by Parvati’s brother Mallikarjuna. This land was acquired by MUDA and in exchange for this land, Parvati was given 14 plots of a total area of 38,283 square feet in Vijayanagar area in 2021. The controversy is that the plots given to the CM’s wife are in Vijayanagar, a posh area of South Mysore. At the same time, the market value of the plot is much higher than her original land in Kesara.
In simple terms, the value of the land in Kesru in exchange for which the CM’s wife was given a plot in Vijayanagar is much higher than her land. The opposition is alleging that the CM conspired to get land for his wife in a posh area under this scheme, due to which a scam of crores of rupees has taken place.
According to the report, Mysore Urban Development Authority had acquired some land from farmers in 1992 to develop it into a residential area. It was separated from agricultural land as per the process, but in 1998, a part of the acquired land was returned to the farmers by MUDA. In this way, this land once again became agricultural land.
Everything was fine till here. Now the dispute started in the year 2004, during this time Siddaramaiah’s wife Parvati’s brother B M Mallikarjun bought 3.16 acres of land in the same land in the year 2004. During this time, in 2004-05, there was a Congress JDS coalition government in Karnataka and Siddaramaiah was the deputy CM. During this time it came to light that this land was once again separated from agricultural land, but by the time Siddaramaiah family reached to take ownership of the land, the layout had already been developed there.
This case of irregularity in MUDA came to light in early July last month. On July 1, a government order was issued for an inquiry led by IAS officer Venkatachalapathi R, stating that there were suspicions of irregularities in MUDA land allotment, which was allotted to influential people instead of giving it to eligible beneficiaries. After the alleged scam came to light in the state, Karnataka Leader of Opposition R. Ashok alleged that Siddaramaiah’s wife Parvati was also a beneficiary in a similar way and she was also given an alternative site in violation of the rules.
MUDA had come up with a scheme for people who lost their land during urban development. In this scheme named 50:50, people who lost land became entitled to 50% of the developed land. This scheme was first implemented in 2009 and was discontinued by the then BJP government in the year 2020. Despite the scheme being discontinued, MUDA continued to acquire and allocate land under the 50:50 scheme. This is the basic controversy, it is alleged that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s wife Parvati was benefited under this.
It is alleged that 3.16 acres of land belonging to the Chief Minister’s wife was acquired by MUDA. In return, 14 sites were allotted in an expensive area. The opposition is vocal in saying that irregularities have been committed in the allotment of these sites to Parvati by MUDA.
The entire matter was raised by three activists Pradeep Kumar, TJ Abraham and Snehmayi Krishna. They had requested Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot to take action against the Chief Minister. In his petition to the Governor, anti-corruption activist Abraham had alleged that this big scam has caused huge loss to the government treasury and requested him to grant permission to prosecute.
Source (PTI) (NDTV) (HINDUSTANTIMES)