BENGALURU: A 70-member strong team from the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) on Friday evening swooped down on the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) head office on Kumara Park West and raided the offices of top officials here. The raid which began at little past 4 pm continued till night.
The ACB had taken up a suo motu case following complaints by the public that BDA staff expected bribes through middlemen for jobs carried out by them and had indulged in corruption and irregularities in allotment of BDA sites.
An official statement from ACB said, "During the raid, it is found that sites have been distributed illegally to people though they were not eligible. Prima facie, it is found that BDA officers and the staff, conniving with some private associations, has flouted the norms of the authority to benefit them. Several documents have been seized during the search operation," the ACB said in an official statement.
A top BDA source said that the raid had to do with irregularities in allotment of sites by Deputy Secretaries as well as land acquisition officers. The BDA has four Deputy Secretaries with each one of them in-charge of allotment of sites of specific dimensions. “Many documents pertaining to site allotment and some cash from the table drawers of officials were also taken away by the ACB team,” the source said.
The raid team was led by three Superintendents and comprised five Deputy Superintendents, 12 Inspectors and 50 other cops.