Bengaluru: ACB swoops down on 9 touts,suspected of influencing Govt officials,Gold, silver,diamonds,luxury watches,cash recovered in 9 locations

Pramesh S Jain & Dr B Thomas (Special correspondent)

Anti Corruption Bureau sleuths on Tuesday conducted search operation at 9 different places in the city pertaining to nine middlemen,who are operating in the BDA and influencing officials by corrupt means to involving in malpractices and other irregularities in Banglore Development Authority .

At least 100 officers of the Anti-Corruption Bureau, in separate teams went to the properties of the alleged middlemen who used influence to access officers of the Bengaluru Development Authority, under the Supervision of Uma Prashant, Superentident of Police,Headquarters .

The raids were conducted at the homes of these nine accused: Raghu BN in Chamrajpet, Mohan at RT Nagar, Manoj at Domlur, Munirathna at Malthalli, Teju at RR Nagara, Aswath at KG Circle, Rama at BDA Layout, Laxmana also at BDA Layout and Chikkahanummaiah at Muddinapalya. All these locations are in Bengaluru.

It may be recalled that one of the middlemen filed a complaint with the city police accusing BDA officials of cheating.

The complaint claimed to have paid huge sum of money even to officials even paid money for the transfer of a senior officer.

The Main door of a palatial house operated through remote in Kenagunte in Mallathahalli belonging to broker Muniratna ,a private garden in front of the house belonging to Yogesh maintained by a group of gardeners,fleet of high end cars and valuables including 4.9 kg of gold valuables 15.2 kgs of silver articles,61.9 grams of diamonds,expensive watches and goggles recovered from the house of Mohan,another BDA broker among the nine middlemen who have been raided by the ACB sleuths on Tuesday.

These seized valuables are some one the highlights of the search and seizure made by the officials along with a heap of files pertaining to properties in and around Bengaluru .

High drama prevailed some time when the accused broker Munirathna refused to hand over the keys of the SUV parked in front of his palatial house .

The ACB contemplated to get a locksmith to open the car,but finally Munirathna handed over the keys.

The officials recovered heap of property documents belonging to several people,which have been seized .

The search and verification of valuables continue ascertain the value of the property and their known source of income.

Some of the middlemen who are shop keepers and real estate agents a decade ago amassed wealth worth several crores which needed a detailed probe,a senior officer,said.

The ACB officials suspect that the accused having close nexus with the BDA officials suspected to have involved in alternate site, compensation scams and also preparing fake documents to claim compensation.

The officials are verifying the documents of properties, household articles and others.

Recently, the ACB officials had arrested four private persons involved in extorting money from BDA officials on the promise of getting away from their respective cases in ACB.