Colonel Bedi was arrested from his Panchsheel Park residence in Delhi.
Highlights
- Col. (Retired) Avneet Singh Bedi was arrested from Panchsheel Park home
- He allegedly acquired land belonging to a civic body in Sahibabad, UP
- Municipal Corporation of Ghaziabad filed a complaint last month
A senior official of Jet Airways was arrested today following allegations of land grabbing. Colonel (retd) Avneet Singh Bedi, Jet's vice president of security, had allegedly encroached on 945 sq metres of land belonging to a civic body in Sahibabad, Uttar Pradesh, and illegally sold portions of it.
A case was registered after the Municipal Corporation of Ghaziabad had filed a complaint last month. According to the police, besides Colonel Bedi, 10 others have been named in the First Information Report or FIR. Four of them are members of his family. None of the accused could produce any papers related to ownership of this land, the FIR said.
The family says the police never asked for any property papers. They say the land belongs to Colonel Bedi's mother and was bought in 1958. "They apparently just barged into his house at 12.30 in the night and arrested him," a member of the family said.
Denying the allegations, Colonel Bedi's family says there is a "conspiracy to malign him".
RS Chopra, Colonel Bedi's brother-in-law, said, "The land is in the name of his 84-year-old mother. There has been registry since 1959. The electricity bill is also in the name of his mother."
Mr Chopra said he had all the documents -- the originals and the copies. "We will show them to the court. This is legal and has been owned by us since 1959," he added.
Sources in the Sahibabad Nagar Nigam said that they had undertaken examination of this plot of land on May 30. At the time, it was noticed that out of 5,690 sqm of land in that area, 954 sqm was allegedly encroached upon.
The civic body's complaint says portions from this encroached land was sold off by Colonel Bedi to six other individuals, and he had retained around 532 sqm of land for himself, which had been given out on rent to a transport company.
The Nagar Nigam also alleged that when they asked Colonel Bedi to show ownership papers, he was unable to do so.
"The airlines doesn't comment on personal matters of our executives/employees," Jet Airways spokesperson said.