Mumbai:
Three people, including a government official and a retired Army Brigadier, have been arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the multi-crore Adarsh Housing scam.
The controversial society's chief promoters R C Thakur, Retd Brigadier Wanchoo and PV Deshmukh, a government official, are among the first key arrests in the case.
Mr Deshmukh who was deputy secretary of the urban development department of the Maharashtra government is the first government official to be arrested in the scam. He had allegedly signed the papers, which allowed environmental clearance to the Adarsh society.
The scam broke in 2010 when it was discovered that an illegal 104-apartment society had come up one of the costliest real estate stretches of India on a prime plot in South Mumbai. Flats in the Adarsh housing society in Mumbai's Colaba area had been cornered at prices unheard of. The society was originally meant to be a six-storey structure to house Kargil War heroes and their relatives, but was later extended to 31 floors allegedly without mandatory permission.
Investigations suggest that politicians, retired Army officers and senior bureaucrats colluded to corner flats in the building.
The scam had rocked the Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra.
The Adarsh Housing scam cost the then Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan his job. Three of his relatives were allotted flats in the high-rise. He was replaced by Prithviraj Chavan.
The arrests come less than two weeks after the Bombay High Court pulled up the CBI for not arresting those accused in the case.
Other high-profile people who were sacked due to the scam were State Information Commissioner Ramanand Tiwari and Member of State Human Rights Commission Subhash Lalla.
Congress MLC Kanhaiyalal Gidwani was arrested and is currently in judicial custody.
They all allegedly played a role in granting illegal clearances to the Adarsh society and in return they got flats in their relatives' names, according to reports.
Union Ministers Sushilkumar Shinde and Vilasrao Deshmukh, both former Congress chief ministers of Maharashtra are also under the scanner.