By Firoz.T.Totanawala
The Bangalore Metro Reporter
THE RICH BANKRUPT
BBMP - HOW TO MOBILISE 10,000 CRORES FROM BOGUS KHATHAS
The BBMP is collapsing on its own weight of scams and frauds. As on today, it does not have the resources to pay the salaries of its employees. The tax collections from various sources are abysmally low and it is looking for the bail out from the government. Had not the government released 250 crores few days back, the Banks would have freezed BBMP accounts. Such is the pathetic financial position.
Instead of attacking the issue at the basics, the BBMP officials are burning midnight oil to find ways and means to mobilise funds to run the show. Already, the officials have stopped all civil works. According to sources, there will not be any fresh works or projects and even the works cleared last year which are yet to start have been put on hold. And nobody has given any thought to go to the basics and one can be sure of BBMP raking in thousands of crores if they addressed the issue in all sincerity and honesty.
Let us start from 2007 when the seven CMCs one TMC and 110 villages were merged with BMP to form BBMP. The BBMP should give special attention to the records of CMCs and villages and can find the following huge revenue losses because of the facts mentioned below.
(a) Most of the CMCs have fabricated khathas to thousands of revenue properties before they were merged with BBMP.
(b) Similarly, most of the village records were tempered by creating khathas to thousands of revenue sites and properties.
(c) Even to this day, these revenue records which are under the possession of the BBMP zonal offices are being tampered to provide BBMP khathas to hundreds of revenue properties.
EXAMPLE
The Bommanahalli CMC records can be verified to discover the huge manipulation. It is alleged that the officials in the Bommanahalli CMC have created thousands of khathas to revenue sites and houses by showing the payment of betterment charges. Here, they used fictitious receipts to make entries in property Registers. In fact, the audit enquiry has found ‘missing’ of an entire official receipt book used for collection of betterment charges. The audit enquiry has laid bare all the omissions and commissions.
When it became known that the CMC will be merged with BBMP, the officials few days before handing over the records worked day and night to fabricate the property registers by including hundreds of revenue properties. It is not that this fraud was committed in the Bommanahalli CMC alone, but, it is the same story with seven CMC and TMC merged with BBMP.
Before the merger of the CMCs, the officials in these CMCs have made crores and crores. As the records were dumped in the BBMP possession, there was no way the inventory of the records could be done. Whatever entries were there in these records, were blindly taken into account by the BBMP officials without questioning. Moreover, as the CMC officials were shifted to BBMP, there was no way of detecting the fraud. In one shot, the BBMP had lost thousand of crores from the CMC ‘fabrication’ business.
Even now, it is not too late. The BBMP should take a thorough inventory of property registers of erstwhile CMCs. If the records are verified with the records in the files, the cat will be out of the bag. Thousands of khathas that were made in CMC for revenue properties on the basis of the ‘receipt’ of betterment charges without any other documents will surface.
THE MODUS OPERANDI
The modus operandi at that time was very simple. Contact the Bill collector or Revenue Inspector with the sale deed of a revenue site and pay Rs. 50,000 to one lakh depending on the size. And a couple of days later, the property would get registered in the khatha register.
How was it done? It is too simple. Enter the number of the receipt for having paid the betterment charges and the name will be entered in the register in the ‘blank’ space left by the officials for this specific purpose. The payment of betterment is shown as paid in earlier months. As the entries and the receipt numbers were fake, there was no way ascertaining the payment of betterment charges. Once the khatha entry is made, the party can get the ‘extract’ of the khatha. The same khatha got transferred to BBMP records. It was as easy as that.
THE SIMPLE SOLUTION
If the BBMP form a ‘Special Audit Party’ of honest officials led by a dedicated senior official, it can unearth thousands of such bogus khathas. The Audit team need not have to do much investigation. It can take out the official remittances of betterment charges from the treasury between 2004 to the end of 2006. It can compare the receipt numbers along with amount paid as betterment charges as shown in the property register! In one go it can detect non-existing receipt numbers and bogus payment. The team can also scrutinise the files in this record. If this exercise is undertaken, the BBMP can detect ‘fraud’ in thousands of crores. If the parties are served with notices threatening criminal action, the result will be mind boggling. The BBMP can collect betterment charges with a penalty of double or more and one can imagine the revenue generated.
The same is the case with village records in 110 villages which were brought under BBMP. It is no secret that Village Accountants have made thousands of khathas to revenue properties for many years, showing them as Gramathana properties. And when it became known that these villages were going to come under BBMP, the Village Accountants intensified their fabrication of village property registers.
Hundreds of revenue sites were brought in the property register and the same was handed over to the BBMP which is bound to accept the entries in property register as genuine. Even government lands were given bogus khatha entries in the village register.
EXAMPLE
To cite one example, the Ullala village near Kengeri had only about 150 entries in the village property list when the same was brought under BBMP. And within a few months, the register sported more than 400 entries! It is alleged that these entries are made by the BBMP Tax Inspector and RI with the convenience of the ARO.
THE MODUS OPERANDI
The modus operandi is very simple. As the village property registers were taken over by BBMP officials without the certification by the Revenue authorities, they keep the custody of the same. As the Register contains many more blank pages, it was easy for the fraudsters to insert bogus entries in the register and based on this bogus entry, the same will be carried to BBMP registers also. Once the entry is made in the register, the parties can get ‘khata extract’.
In Herohalli Panchayat, the property register contained only about 200 khathas. But now the register has more than 1000 khathas. In some cases like KR Pura, Mahadevapura, Byatarayanapura, the BBMP officials use the services of the Village Accountants to make the entries in village records so as to show some authenticity. In the 110 villages merged with BBMP in 2007, one can find more than 10 thousand bogus entries. Even today, such fabrications are being done with impunity. Very recently, the RI and TI along with a case worker, have started giving ‘bogus’ khathas to hundreds of revenue sites in Vajarahalli Hemmigepura ward, which is the biggest ward (Ward No.198) in BBMP.
In the above cases of CMCs and 110 villages, there are more than two lakh bogus khathas. If the BBMP makes efforts to detect the frauds by forming a special squad, and enforce its powers to collect the betterment charges and ‘compounding penalty of one or two times the betterment charge from those who obtained ‘bogus’ khathas, it can make up more than 10,000 crores in one go! But the question is - Who will bell the cat?
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