CHENNAI: The Commissioner of Land Administration (CLA) has recommended criminal action against a former Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) of Tambaram, who is now a District Revenue Officer (DRO), for his alleged involvement in fraudulently issuing patta for a land parcel worth several crores in Zamin Pallavaram to a private company.
The CLA, S Nagarajan, in his order issued on February 7, cancelled the order granting patta for the 1.79 acres of land. It was passed by the then RDO, Rajakumar, in July 2019. The CLA also directed the Chengalpattu Collector, AR Rahul Nadh, to take disciplinary action against five revenue staff who had served at the Tambaram RDO office as the official records related to the order were missing.
The recommendations were made by the CLA after he conducted an inquiry based on a petition related to a land dispute between two private firms came up for hearing in the Madras High Court (HC) in September last year.
During the hearing in 2021, the then RDO of Thambaram, D Ravichandran, informed the HC that the original files related to Rajakumar’s order were missing. Following this, the court had ordered the CLA to investigate it.
The land originally belongs to a private company, which claimed ownership of the property by tracing the title to a sale deed in 1944. However, in 2018, a private individual submitted an application to the then RDO, Rajakumar, seeking patta for the land and sought cancellation of the patta registered in the name of J Damodharan.
Rajakumar accepted the application and accordingly transferred the patta to the name of the applicant on July 12, 2019. An inquiry revealed that Damodharan was fictitious and introduced into official records for the purpose of transferring the property to the new applicant.
The settlement officer from the Directorate of Survey and Settlement, who was deputed by the CLA, inspected the Tambaram RDO office on December 29, 2019, and found that the original files related to the order were missing.
“It is clear that the entire RDO office has miserably failed to keep the government asset under safe custody, which is a serious cause of concern. A suspicion arises as to whether the said file was misplaced wantonly to favour someone,” read the CLA order.
Considering the circumstances, the order passed by Rajakumar has been cancelled, added the order. Collector Rahul Nadh could not be reached for comments.