2 ACS officers arrested in land fraud scam in Guwahati

Guwahati: Two senior Assam Civil Service (ACS) officers were arrested by the Crime Branch of Guwahati City Police in two separate cases of land fraud scam on Thursday.

They were Lakhyajit Duwaria, an ACS officer of the 2016 batch and currently working as the deputy secretary of the medical education and research department; and Lakhyjyoti Das, presently additional district commissioner of Nagaon district.

Lakhyajit Duwaria was the circle officer of Guwahati Revenue Circle while Lakhyajit Duwaria was the circle officer of Dispur Revenue Circle when they allegedly committed the offence.

After court production, both the officials are now under police custody for interrogation.

Lakhyajit Duwaria was arrested for ordering a mutation of a plot of land favouring a fraud Pradip Kumar Das based on fake land documents in collusion with other accused persons.  

Duwaria had passed the order when he was the circle officer of the Guwahati Revenue Circle of Kamrup Metro district.

He was charged with Bharalumukh Police case number 357/2023 under section 420/406/409/468/471/34 of the Indian Penal Code.

The case was registered based on the FIR filed by Dushmanta Medhi, son of Late Birobhadra Medhi (grandson of Late Kaliram Medhi, the third president of Asam Sahitya Sabha) of Bharalumukh, Guwahati, against the then circle officer and his accomplices involved in the manufactured mutation of a prime plot of land measuring 3 kathas 10 lechas, covered by the dag number 1324 of KP Patta No 803 & Dag No 1323 of KP Patta No 802 situated at Santipur under revenue village Sahar Guwahati Part-1. 

The police also arrested land broker Tapash Choudhury, Sangeet Jain son of the vendee (Sarita Devi Jain), lat mandal Ratneswar Das in connection with the case.

However, Pradip Kumar Das has obtained a pre-arrest bail from the court and he is being questioned.

Lakhyjyoti Das had intentionally and fraudulently in connivance with some of the land grabbers and officials mutated a plot of land in favour of Purnima Bonjang by misusing his official power and thereby depriving the informant Sabir Shah of the genuine plot of land at Dwarandha in the Six Mile area of the city.

The case was taken up by the Crime Branch based on an FIR lodged by one Sabir Shah, son of Late Kaishar Shah, a resident of Shantipur, Ward No 3 of Golaghat alleging that the plot of land that he had purchased had been mutated by the Das in the name of one Purnima Bonjang without examining the genuineness of the case.