Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister S. Suresh Kumar is trying to save his “Mr Clean” image by returning the 50x80 feet site allotted to him under the chief minister’s ‘G’ category and resigning from the cabinet.
Mr Kumar might not have any lucrative motive or monetary gains by getting the residential site allotted to him, but he slipped at several levels. S. Bhaskaran, a BJP party worker and resident of Rajajinagar, who brought the scam to light, has procured documents through the Right To Information Act to prove that the minister has given a false affidavit claiming that he, his spouse or dependent children do not own any site under the Bangalore Development Authority jurisdiction.
Mr Bhaskaran says the first flaw was that Mr Suresh Kumar, who claims to be honest and simple, filed a false affidavit while seeking the G category site. According to the documents available with Deccan Chronicle, Mr Kumar wrote a letter to the chief minister in February 2009 seeking the residential site. He requests that since his mother’s house on Railway Parallel Road in Gayatrinagar had been identified for demolition for a road widening project, he would need a residential site. He also mentions that Mr S.M. Krishna, as chief minister, offered him a residential site, but he refused.
On November 26, 2009, the BDA allotted a 50x80 plot on survey number 78 to Mr Kumar. When even that site was notified by the government, Mr Kumar was promised an alternative site in RMV 2nd stage. Mr Kumar got the site registered in his name in April 2011. Meanwhile, Mr Kumar’s mother and daughter were allotted two sites by the Sri Satyanarayana Housing Development Cooperation Society Ltd in December 2009.
Mr Bhaskaran questions why Mr Kumar did not reveal this fact when his site was registered in 2011. “Why did Mr Kumar file a false affidavit stating that neither he nor his children own sites in Karnataka or any parts of the country,” he asked. Another ‘error’ was that Mr Kumar got the site claiming that his mother’s house would be razed during road widening. But he sold the house even before the notification order was lifted. According to rules, a notified property cannot be sold unless the government issues a GO rescinding its earlier order, Mr Bhaskaran said.