BENGALURU: The Justice HS Kempanna Commission, which was probing the alleged illegal denotification of lands in the Arkavathy Layout by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, has submitted its report three years after it was set up. According to sources, the report which was submitted to Karnataka Chief Secretary Subhash Chandra Khuntia, is said to have given a clean chit to the Chief Minister. It has attributed the alleged irregularities to lapses on part of some middle and lower rung officials of the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) and the Urban Development department. Justice Kempanna, who submitted the 1,861-page report, said, “I have completed my task after studying all aspects of the complaints received about alleged irregularities in development of the Arkavathy Layout. Now it is up to the government to decide the future course of action.”
The Commission was constituted in August 2014 after BJP raised a storm over the issue in the legislature alleging that Siddaramaiah was a direct beneficiary of the denotification of 541 acres of land. The party had sought a CBI inquiry into the alleged irregularities. Siddaramaiah refused a CBI probe and announced a judicial inquiry. He also said that the denotification of 541 acres was in accordance with guidelines laid down by the Karnataka High Court.
The Commission probed alleged denotification of 983 acres of land which included pockets of land allegedly denotified during the previous BJP regime as well. The terms of reference for the Commission included — whether the deletion/exclusion of lands by BDA and the government after final notification was issued to a total extent of 983.33 acres of lands are in violation of the various court orders pertaining to the layout; whether the various quasi-judicial orders passed by the four Land Acquisition Officers authorised are legal and valid; whether the various resolutions passed by BDA to exclude from acquisition in final notification as per court orders are legal and valid and; whether any undue favour has been shown to landowners by the authorities while exercising their powers.
What is land denotification?
Denotification is a process of dropping some pockets of land from acquisition process for development projects by the government after issuing the preliminary notification for acquisition. The denotified land is free to be used or sold by the owner of such land.