Eknath Khadse seeks CBI probe into "Rs 80,000 crore land scam"

MUMBAI: Maharashtra government should seek a CBI inquiry into the alleged "Rs 80,000 crore land scam" in which names of influential leaders were used, Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly Eknath Khadse said here today.

"I will meet the PM and Union Home Minister on the issue," he told reporters in the state BJP office this evening. A special SIT of CBI should probe the issue, he added.

There were altogether 116 such land deals in Pune, Mumbai and Nashik wherein the beneficiaries cheated and misled the state government, Khadse said. A few cases involved defence land, he added.

The BJP leader's demand for CBI probe follows an FIR registered against 14 businessmen and establishments in Pune regarding allotment of a land to a trust.

Right To Information (RTI) activist Ravi Barhate had claimed that the accused named in the FIR connived to fraudulently claim government land as "soil grant entitlement" in the name of a Pune-based trust to extract various permissions as well as concessions, by misrepresenting it as a registered public charitable trust in 1989, Khadse said.