HC suspends ban on sale of Nagaram lands bought by IAS, IPS officers

Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Friday suspended an order that had directed the Ranga Reddy district collector to place certain lands in Nagaram village under the prohibitory list, bringing relief to a group of senior IAS and IPS officers accused of purchasing disputed Bhoodan lands.

The court’s division bench of Justices Moushumi Bhattacharya and Gadi Praveen Kumar passed the order while hearing the writ filed by some senior officers, including Ravi Gupta IPS, Tarun Joshi, IPS, Renu Goyal and Dr. Gyanmudra, wife of former Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar IAS (retd). It challenged an October 17 interim order by Justice Kunuru Lakshman.

Justice Lakshman had earlier refused to vacate a April 24 order by Justice CV Bhaskar Reddy, which directed the collector to prohibit any alteration or modification of lands in survey no 194 and 195 of Nagaram based on allegations that they were Bhoodan lands illegally purchased by top officials.

The division bench, however, observed that the lands in survey no 194 and 195 were not Bhoodan lands but patta lands, citing documentary evidence and affidavits on record.

The controversy began when Birla Mallesh of Maheshwaram mandal filed a writ alleging that several senior civil servants and police officers had fraudulently acquired Bhoodan lands through misuse of posts. He sought an inquiry by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the Telangana Vigilance Commission and the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT). Mallesh accused the officers of forgery, tampering with revenue records and unlawful transfer of Bhoodan land titles in their names. Acting on his petition, the court had initially directed the collector to maintain status quo and include the contested lands in the prohibitory list, pending further examination.

During Friday’s hearing, senior counsel Niranjan Reddy, representing the appellants, contended that the disputed lands were legitimate patta lands, not Bhoodan properties.

He pointed to multiple affidavits supporting this. The counter filed by the collector on June 10, affirming that the lands in survey no 194 and 195 were Patta lands. The ED’s counter filed on June 25 stating its probe found no evidence of Bhoodan status.

The Bhoodan Yagna Board’s declaration that no Bhoodan lands existed in the survey numbers. The RDO’s report confirmed the same. Reddy argued that Justice Bhaskar Reddy’s earlier order was issued ex parte and without complete factual presentation, misleading the single judge into sustaining the interim restriction.

He submitted that most officers involved were either retired or nearing retirement and had invested their lifetime savings to acquire residential plots, emphasising that the accusations linking them to fraudulent purchases were unfounded and defamatory.

The division bench noted that prima facie material placed before it indicated the lands were patta holdings, not Bhoodan properties. Accordingly, it decided to suspend the single judge’s interim order pending further examination of the case.

The court’s decision provides temporary relief to the senior officers, although the writ filed by Mallesh continues to remain under judicial consideration.