Chennai: The city police’s crime branch personnel on Monday arrested six persons, including a suspended revenue divisional officer and a suspended deputy tahsildar in connection with a case of land grab involving 9 acres, worth over Rs 89 crore, in Semmanchery village, near Sholinganallur.
The Police identified the arrested revenue officials as M. Ettiyappan, 58, former RDO residing in Thiruvotriyur, and R.V. Punithavathy, 42, former deputy tahsildar of Sholinganallur.
According to the police, Ettiyappan and Punithavathy had created bogus proceedings for converting the land from government tharisu to grama natham and then fraudulently issued patta to grab the land in connivance with four other accused.
The other accused were identified as Ravi, Venkitesan, Devan and Ramalingam, all hailing from Velachery.
The police action was based on a complaint submitted to city police commissioner S. George by D. Ravichandran, tahsildar, Sholinganallur.
During the probe, police found that Ettiyappan, the then RDO, Tambaram, in August 2011 had issued bogus proceedings to convert the government tharisu land to grama natham. Based on the above bogus proceedings, Punithavathy, the then deputy tahsildar, issued a patta in favour of Ravi for the 9.5 acres. In turn, Ravi colluded with three others, bifurcated the land and sold it to different persons.
All the arrested were remanded in judicial custody and the police are hunting for a few other suspects involved in the case.
