VISAKHAPATNAM: Finally, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the land scam allegations in Vizag has been granted a two-month extension of term. The government has issued the orders considering SIT chief Vineet Brijlal’s request letter seeking more time to complete the assigned task. The SIT sought the term extension some 20 days ago as its tenure lapsed in August last week. However, the probe team kept working from the YCPC premises. Confirming that they have received the orders pertaining to extension of tenure on Wednesday, SIT chief Vineet Brijlal said they would speed up the pending investigation to finish the assigned task as per schedule.
“It is a hard task. But, our staff are working diligently to complete the investigations in stipulated time. So far, we have cleared more than half of the complaints that fell under the SIT ambit and the remaining should be cleared soon,” the SIT chief told Express.Now, the SIT is working on the complaints pertaining to 69 NOCs which were allegedly issued illegally in the last 10 to 15 years in the names of benamis and fraudsters.
The SIT received 2,866 complaints of which 2,534 were transferred to the collectorate for action as they were out of the SIT ambit. “Even now, we are receiving at least five complaints through registered post and phone calls daily. We are submitting reports with evidence and recommendations to the police stations concerned through the Collector as we are not empowered to register cases,” Brijlal said, adding that inquiry reports for more than 50 per cent of the complaints have been sent so far.
Key land documents seized
Acting upon the recommendations of the SIT, PM Palem police on Wednesday conducted searches in several houses to recover old land records. Simultaneous raids were conducted at five places in which the police seized some key documents. The police conducted searches in the houses of former Karanam V Patrudu at Madhurawada, former sarpanch B Srinu and former document writer Narayana Rao at Boravanipalem, Chenna Dasu at Yendada and seized old revenue records and documents. “As part of the investigation into the record tampering by jailed former tahsildar M Sankar Rao, we conducted raids and recovered some key documents,” the police said.