CBI questions Bhupinder Singh Hooda in land allotment scam

NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation on Monday quizzed former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda in connection with alleged irregularities in the allotment of 14 industrial plots by the Haryana Urban Development Authority ( HUDA).

The case pertains to alleged irregularities in the allocation of industrial plots at Panchkula in 2012 when Hooda was HUDA chairman.

The Central Bureau of Investigation questioned Hooda for the first time against whom the agency had registered a case last year. Last week, the agency had also grilled Chattar Singh, Hooda’s then principal secretary, in connection with the case.

Singh is currently a member of the Union Public Service Commission ( UPSC). Hooda was on Monday questioned for over six hours by the Central Bureau of Investigation.

An FIR was registered by the investigating agency after the vigilance bureau of the current Haryana government had forwarded the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation. Hooda had denied all the allegations levelled against him and accused the Manohar Lal government of political vendetta.

After registration of FIR last year, the Central Bureau of Investigation had carried out searches at 16 locations, including Chandigarh, Panchkula, Faridabad, Delhi, Gurgaon, Karnal, Kurukshetra and Rohtak, against former bureaucrats and beneficiaries who were alleged to have used their links in obtaining industrial plots at Panchkula.

In its FIR, the Central Bureau of Investigation had alleged that the Haryana Urban Development Authority violated key rules while allotting land. The plots were allotted, the FIR read, by making irregular changes in the criteria after the last date of submission of applications had passed.