A week after the Rajasthan government had written to the CBI for a probe into alleged land scams in Bikaner, the investigative agency on Wednesday registered 18 cases related to the allotment of land to private firms, including those associated with Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra.
The Congress had accused the Vasundhara Raje-led BJP government of misusing CBI ahead of assembly elections.
“As many as 18 FIRs are registered and four of them are against Vadra’s company which was allegedly involved in illegal purchase of nearly 275 bigha (more than 100 acres) land. All the 18 FIRs are in connection with purchase of close to 1,400 bigha (approx 550 acres) land in fake names," Home Minister Gulab Chand Kataria was quoted as saying by PTI last week.
He alleged that Vadra’s company was the third party to purchase 275 bigha land in the year 2010 and it sold the pieces of land to a fourth party in 2012.
“Four FIRs are related with Vadra’s company and now the state government has written to the CBI to investigate them altogether. The issue was also raised in the state assembly in 2014,” Kataria had said.
Vadra described the state government’s probe call as a “malicious persecution”.
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