The search operation also covered the residential premises of UPSC member Chattar Singh who was then Additional Private Secretary to Hooda, CBI sources said.
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The CBI took over the investigation of the case from Manesar police in Gurgaon that had already registered a First Information Report (FIR) against some public servants in Haryana and some private people.
The raid comes just days after the Justice Dhingra Committee, set up to probe the irregularities, submitted its report on the land grab case to current Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar.
Ever since the Bharatiya Janata Party government took over in Haryana in 2014, Hooda has found himself embroiled in one controversy after the other with cases registered against him or probes being initiated.
During searches at Dhillon’s Chandigarh residence, the investigators recovered documents of four properties in Gurgaon, Panchkula and Chandigarh, an official said, adding a documents of an agriculture land in Punjab was also recovered from his house.
The land in question was acquired by the builders in Manesar, Naurangpur and Lakhnoula in the Gurgaon district. The land’s worth of Rs 1,600 crore was reduced to Rs 100 crore for the convenience of the builders, allegedly.
“The Haryana government led by Hooda had issued a notification under the Land Acquisition Act for acquisition of land measuring about 912 acres for setting up of an Industrial Model Township in these villages”, the official told the Hindu. This resulted in huge losses to the farmers and to the state government as well. The plot was allotted six months after the Hooda government came to power in 2005.
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The case was opened in 2015 after the BJP established their government in Haryana.
