Kolli Raghuram Reddy SIT to probe into Amaravati land scam

1. Cabinet Sub Committee found 4,000 acrs in the scam
   
2. TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu and other then cabinet ministers and their relatives will be inquired
   

Amaravati: The Special Investigation Team (SIT), constituted by the State government is going to commence its probing from the Amaravati land scam. Though, it has given a greater task to critically probe into all the allegations on the previous government, the Amaravati land scam is in its first priority.

The key highlights of the Amaravati land scam are including insider trading of land committed by several individuals having prior knowledge of the location of the new capital. Here, the individuals in the sense, those who have direct or indirect involvement in the then Government while deciding the location and boundaries of Amaravati capital city of Andhra Pradesh.

The second most important aspect given to the SIT is manipulations of boundaries of capital under Land Pooling Scheme for monetary gains through appreciation of land value, revealed the sources in the Chief Minister's Office. Further, the SIT is asked to probe into the third kind of corrupt practice. That is, a systematic inclusion of areas belonging to TDP leaders, ruling party leaders and supporters into the new capital zone.

All these irregularities were highlighted by the Cabinet Sub Committee. While highlighting the irregularities, the Cabinet Sub Committee also suggested the government that there is a need for a thorough probe into the allegations by the experts.

In addition to the Cabinet Sub Committee findings, the SIT will also take the information from the Crime Investigation Department (CID). Already CID also lodged cases on these land scams.

The State government has directed the SIT to enquire into the matter, register cases against the accused persons irrespective of their political or executive position, investigate further into the facts and then conclude the investigation according to the provisions of CrPC, on the Amaravati land scam matter.

The SIT will function as a nodal single point contact for all matters, including for sharing of information and coordinating if necessary, with the State and Central Investigating Agencies.

One of the senior most IPS officers, Kolli Raghuram Reddy, DIG, Intelligence department is being appointed as the Head of the SIT.

Another two IPS officers, in the rank of Superintendent of Police, including Babujee Attada, SP, Visakhapatnam and Ch. Venkata Appala Naidu, SP –II, Intelligence were also inducted as members, apart from other senior and junior officials in the SIT.

There are different types of SITs being constituted by the governments. In this case, this Raghuram Reddy SIT is more powerful like that of the SIT headed by D.R. Karthikeyan, IPS,

former Director, CBI, which was appointed by then union government to probe into the Rajiv Gandhi Assassination.

Raghuram Reddy SIT has powers to conduct thorough inquiry, registers the case. It takes up further investigation, files charge sheet and for doing so, it is notified as Police Station.