CAG pulls up army for giving prime city plot to pvt builder

New Delhi: The CAG has criticized the army and defence estates authoritiesfor letting a private builder usurp their land in Mumbai, with the office of the then minister of state for defence production Rao Inderjit Singh also playing a role,by issuing "an irregular NOC''. 

    The case of the 5,166 sq-m land at Kandivli, which was in the possession of Central Ordnance Depot (COD) of Mumbai since1942,isbeing probedby the CBI, as reported by TOI earlier. Faced with land scams like Adarsh, Malad and Kandivli, MoD has been forced to now specify that station military authorities are no longer allowed todirectly issueNOCsto private builders. The latest CAG report said that even after "certain fraudulent activities regarding theland(Kandivli)cametotheir notice, COD did not get the land demarcated in its favour, which facilitated the usurpation of the landfrom the army''. 
    After M/s Neo Pharma Pvt Ltd (Kalpataru Bldrs), began development work on the land in 2007, the COD placed sentries there for protection. "(But) the company lodged a complaint with minister Rao Inderjit Singh,whereby his personalsecretary wrote to the then Army chief's secretariat for 'appropriate action','' theCAGsaid. TNN