Adarsh Housing Society scandal

The Adarsh Housing Society is a 31-story building constructed on prime real estate in Colaba, Bombay, for the welfare of war Widows and personnel of India's Ministry of Defence.

[1][2] In year 2011, a report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) said, "The episode of Adarsh co-operative Housing Society reveals how a group of select officials, placed in key posts, could subvert rules and regulations in order to grab prime government land – a public property – for personal benefit.

The commission was headed by retired High Court judge Justice J A Patil, with N N Kumbhar acting as member secretary.

Praveen Wategaonkar filed Criminal PIL later seeking invoking of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) into the case.

[19][20] Reacting to these petitions and based on the slow pace of the investigation in the last two years, Bombay High Court severely castigated Enforcement Directorate for its failure to initiate any probe in the matter on 28 February 2012.

[19][21][22] The High Court, again on 12 March 2012, severely castigated the CBI for not arresting any of the accused in spite of having evidence and ordered it to take action without fear or favour.

[20][23] ED having registered a case under Prevention of Money Laundering Act, has decided to launch attachment proceedings of the flats after going through the latest chargesheet filed by CBI.

[25] Following the Court's criticism, the CBI carried out eight arrests including two retired Major Generals Tej Kaul and AR Kumar, retired brigadier MM Wanchoo, former General Officer Commanding(GOC) of Maharashtra, Gujarat and Goa, Adarsh promoter Kanhaiyalal Gidwani and Pradeep Vyas, the then city collector and currently, finance secretary (expenditure) in the Govt.

Accordingly, on 22 March 2012, the Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Prithviraj Chavan announced in the legislative assembly that the two IAS officers whose names have featured in the report: Pradeep Vyas and Jairaj Phatak have been suspended from government service.

Former Congress MLC Kanhaiyalal Gidwani was reported to have as many as ten flats, which he had bought on behalf of top politicians.

Jagiasi allegedly asked an Air India (AI) official, one of the accused in the case, to pay a bribe of Rs 5 million in exchange for diluting charges levelled against him.

[29] Jairaj Phatak and Ramanand Tiwari were arrested by the CBI on 3 April 2012, for their alleged involvement in receiving illegal gratification in the Adarsh Housing Society.

Mar 2015: Bombay High Court also dismisses Ashok Chavan's petition seeking deletion of his name from the case.

Oct 2015: CBI submits fresh evidence to Maharashtra Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao seeking sanction once again.

It was decided that the commission would be led by a retired Bombay High Court judge JA Patil[34] while former State Chief Secretary P Subramanian would be the member.

[35] On 27 June 2012, while deposing before the two-member panel probing the affair, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Union Minister and former chief minister of Maharashtra contended that land was allotted to the housing society after getting clearance from the Revenue Department, passing the buck to his successor, Ashok Chavan who headed the department then.

[36] Adarsh not a saga of ideal cooperation but a shameless tale of blatant violations of statutory provisions, rules and regulations.

The report also said Adarsh enjoyed the "political patronage" of Late Vilasrao Deshmukh, Sushil Kumar Shinde, Chavan, Sunil Tatkare and Rajesh Tope.

K. Sankaranarayanan, Governor of Maharashtra (2010-2014) in 2013 rejected the proposal of Central Bureau of Investigations to grant sanction to prosecute former Chief Minister Ashok Chavan for having favoured Adarsh Society by way of allotment of additional Floor Space Index illegally.

[40] However the special court rejected the CBI's plea to drop his name from the list of accused in the Adarsh case.

[41] Another Public Interest Litigation has been moved by activist Ketan Tirodkar seeking to prosecute State Cabinet for having rejected Judicial Commission findings pertaining to Adarsh housing affair.[4].

Adarsh Housing Society has defended its actions as similar to other housing societies such as Samata, Nyay Sagar & likes in which "serving and retired judges already owned homes in Mumbai but transferred these in names of their children to become eligible for apartments in Samata & Nyay Sagar.