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| Govt sends Khoda's file back to Raj Bhawan? | | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Oct 2: General Administration Department (GAD) is understood to have clarified certain queries to Raj Bhawan with regard to the former Director General of Police Kuldeep Khoda's recommendation as the State's first Chief Vigilance Commissioner (CVC). However, a negative addendum this time around could again derail appointment of functionaries for the new integrity watchdog.
Earlier this year, Raj Bhawan had reportedly raised certain queries with regard to nomination of Khoda as CVC and that of the retired IAS, Mohammad Sayeed Khan, as one of the two Commissioners. No query had been reportedly raised about the retired IAS officer RK Jerath.
Usually credible bureaucratic sources disclosed to Early Times that GAD and Law Department had completed the exercise and the file had been finally returned to Governor with fresh recommendation of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah in favour of the three proposed appointments. State's lately created J&K State Vigilance Commission had been created by way of an SRO by the Government on February 15th, 2011. However, appointment of Chief Vigilance Commissioner and the two Commissioners has not happened in the last 19 months.
Three days before Khoda's retirement as DGP, Government had organised the first meeting of the Search Committee in May this year and recommended Khoda for the top position in SVC and Messers Mohammad Sayeed Khan and R.K. Jerath for the two slots of Commissioners. However, Leader of the Opposition, Mehbooba Mufti, who happens to be one of the members of the search committee, had raised some serious objections to Khoda's appointment as CVC.
Even as no authorized official was available for confirmation, sources insisted that Government had yet again sent strong recommendations in Khoda's favour. Nevertheless, bureaucracy is said to have sent the file back to Governor with a negative addendum. According to these sources, a document containing facts of the retired DGP's acquisition of three strips of land, adjoining his residential house in Chhanni Himmat, Jammu, has also been appended to the file.
According to the document, Khoda had long back managed to "grab" three strips of Housing Board's land adjoining his house in Sector No:1 Chhanni Himmat, Jammu. The space he acquired on cash payment from Housing Board, was reportedly reserved for construction of a rotary. Even as a number of IAS officers have similarly acquired Housing Board land in Jammu, Khoda has been at the receiving end of RTI activists and men in bureaucracy, some projecting him as a "land grabber".
Khoda's detractors have argued that MD or any other functionary of Housing Board were not by law competent to allot or sell off any piece of land after the same had been notified for a Housing Colony or any other public purpose with the sanction of Master Plan by the State Cabinet.
The document shows that Khoda has acquired a strip of 900 sft area from Housing Board on payment of Rs 2,74,600 by way of a lease deed registered by Sub Judge Jammu on February 6th, 2008. Khoda was DGP in the year 2008. He is said to have subsequently two more strips. The land in question stood earmarked for construction of a roundabout (rotary). Quoting Supreme Court order in the petition titled Dr G.N. Khajuria versus Delhi Development Authority, a complainant in Jammu has been calling for restoration of the acquired piece of land as a rotary.
It was not immediately clear as to who had attached the negative document to Khoda's file despite recommendations of Chief Minister and other members of the search committee, excluding PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti, in his favour. |
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