ED arrests two in Bikaner land scam

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on 22 December arrested Jaiprakash Bagarwa and Ashok Kumar under a Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in Rajasthan's Bikaner land scam case.

As per the ED, Ashok Kumar is a close associate of Mahesh Nagar of M/s Skylight Hospitality Pvt Ltd.

The Bikaner land scam is a land grabbing case, in which fraudsters in collusion with the state government officials got allotted land on the name of fictitious individuals (who were non-existent) which was actually earmarked for people who got displaced due to the creation of Mahajan Field Firing Range.

The fraudsters created forged allotment letters purported to be issued by the Colonisation department and 1422 Bigha land was recorded in revenue record in the name of these fictitious allottees without due



verification of these allotment letters from the department.

Tehsil officers like Patwari, Girdawar, and Tehsildar were active partners in the conspiracy and fraud and allotted land to fictitious people without any verification.

Rajasthan Police had filed 18 chargesheets initially and later on, two more chargesheets were filed by the state police, making Ashok Kumar an accused among others.

"M/s Skylight Hospitality Pvt. Ltd had purchased 69.55-hectare land in Rs. 72 lacs, sold it to M/s Allegeny finlease Pvt Ltd for Rs. 5.15 crore and earned huge profit of Rs. 4.43 crore. M/s Allegeny finlease Pvt. Ltd as a company is not involved in any real business activity and many of its shareholders were found to be non-existent during the investigation," a release by the ED said.