Bangalore:
Spelling fresh trouble for Karnataka's ruling BJP, police today booked a case against Law Minister S Suresh Kumar and two others for allegedly denotifying over four acres meant for construction of houses for slum dwellers.
Bangalore Metropolitan Task Force police registered a case against Suresh Kumar, M Krishnaiah Setty, former Housing Minister, and VP Baligar, former Principal Secretary to then Chief Minister for allegedly denotifying four acres 20 guntas (one gunta is about 1,086 sq ft) at Laggere in Bangalore North taluk.
The case was filed under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act- 1988 and CRPC, acting on a complaint filed by one Dinesh Kallalli.
Kallalli said in his complaint that in 1982, 4.2 acres in survey number 9/2, which belonged to K Gopinath, brother of senior RSS leader Narahari, was notified to build houses for the financially weaker and downtrodden sections.
The process of land acquisition process was completed in 2003 and six years after the land came into its possession, the Karnataka Slum Development Board commenced construction of houses by calling for tenders.
When the construction process was in the final stage, the BS Yeddyurappa government took the decision to denotify land in 2009 under the alleged influence of Suresh Kumar who was the Law Minister then.
Kallalli charged the decision to denotify the land was taken to help Gopinath though the KSDB stoutly objected, alleging it was against the interest of the weaker sections and also that the tender process had almost been completed.
But the government went ahead with its decision, he alleged.
Meanwhile, Suresh Kumar told PTI from Bellary that "I am not a minister in-charge of Bangalore or Bangalore Development Authority, it is held by the Chief Minister. I do not know in what context I have been named in the complaint. Only after knowing the details, I can react".