Officials of the district administration on Wednesday demolished an illegal layout developed by three city-based builders at Yelahanka town. It was spread across one acre and 25 guntas of government grazing land worth Rs. 15 crore.
The encroached land is part of the 640 acres of gomala (government grazing land) in Jarak Bande Kaval (survey number 1). The three builders had even created land ownership records in their names from fake documents purportedly from Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP).
N. Nandish, Revenue Inspector of Yelahanka division, said the builders — K.T. Kumar, K. Ramesh and Srinivas — had formed the layout by marking sites measuring 600 sq ft each and sold them.
“Though this is part of the gomala land and protected by the Revenue Department, the builders had acquired 1.25 acres and got the khatas (title deeds) from BBMP by forging documents,” said a senior official of the Revenue Department.
The Revenue Department has registered a case against the three builders under the Land Revenue Act with the Mahalakshmi Layout police, he said. This is not the first time the builders have done this, said a senior revenue official. According to him, the three had encroached the same piece of land one-and-half years ago, which was recovered with great difficulty.
Though the department had submitted a detailed report and got the demolition orders three months ago, it was put on hold until Tuesday due to various reasons, said the officials, adding that the builders tried to get political influence to stop the demolition, but in vain.
“We even switched off our mobile phones to avoid calls to prevent the demolition,” Mr. Nandish said.
