Former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan is among the 13 persons named in the formal complaint registered by the CBI in the Adarsh Cooperative Housing Society scam. The CBI on Saturday sent the copy of the FIR to the special CBI court in Mumbai through SpeedPost.
The details of the FIR were not immediately available. A copy of the FIR was handed over to special judge M.R. Aglawe in a sealed envelope. According to CBI sources, the general secretary of Adarsh Housing Society, R.C. Thakur, former brigadier M.M. Wanchoo and Congress leader K.L. Gidwani are allegedly the main conspirators in building the society illegally.
The CBI, however, did not clarify whether Mr Chavan, who had to step down as Maharashtra chief minister because of his alleged involvement in the Adarsh Society scam, has been named as an accused. Sources said that while a certain role has been attributed to the former Maharashtra CM, he has not been made an accused.
The CBI FIR names former Major General A.R. Kumar and Brig. R.C. Sharma (Retd) for allegedly giving a no-objection certificate and allegedly claiming the land did not belong to the defence ministry.
An official statement issued by the CBI said, “After completion of the preliminary inquiry, the CBI on Saturday registered a case related to the Adarsh Cooperative Housing Society. The case has been registered against 13 accused persons belonging to the Army, defence estate office, government of Maharashtra, public servants and unknown persons. The investigation is in progress.”
Indian Penal Code sections related to criminal conspiracy, cheating and dishonesty, and forgery, and sections under the Prevention of Corruption Act have been slapped against the accused persons.
It took the CBI 10 weeks to file the FIR in the case after the agency first launched preliminary investigations. The development comes in the wake of the Bombay high court seeking to know what action the CBI had taken in the matter without registering an FIR in the case. The high court had directed the investigating agency at a hearing on January 18 to file the FIR within two weeks.