In a rare occurrence, a sub-registrar caught a realtor, who attempted to sell land worth Rs 15 crore with forged documents, red handed here on Thursday.
Police said Velachery Sub-Registrar MG Dhamu lodged a complaint seeking action against a person who had come to register the sale deed of a piece of land with forged documents.
Velachery Inspector Muthuraja said that Tamil Mani, a realtor and resident of Thulasingapuram in St Thomas Mount, had produced documents required for the sale deed before the Sub-Registrar’s Office (SRO).
The officials at SRO grew suspicious over the documents produced and subsequent verification revealed that the signature in their register did not match the supporting documents produced by the realtor.
Police sources said Tamil Mani approached the SRO at Velachery seeking to register the sale deed of a 16,800 sq ft plot, which was part of 54,000 sq ft of land located in the prime area near Velachery MRTS Railway Station. The guideline value of the land was over Rs 7 crore and the market value would be more than twice that amount, they said.
Tamil Mani produced three documents — one mother document dated 1933, a settlement document registered in 2004 at the Velachery SRO and a power of attorney registered in July this year. The officials found that the language used in the 1933 mother document was inappropriate. On suspicion, they checked the settlement document that was registered in the same SRO.
It was revealed that the actual owner of the land had signed in the settlement document whereas in the one produced by Tamil Mani, it only had a thumb impression.
Following the police complaint, Mani was arrested and remanded to judicial custody on Friday. He reportedly kept claiming innocence during the course of probe and stated that the documents were authentic.
The capture of the alleged fake artiste came as a welcome change to a trend that had been noticed ever since Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa ordered formulation of Anti-Land Grab Units across the State to retrieve lands grabbed with fake papers.
The police said that in most cases, they came across situations where the usurped land was promptly registered at SROs with forged papers creating further complication.