Assets, worth ₹14.23 crore, belonging to the son of a retired IAS officer K Rajamanickam who served as the secretary to late Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, wife of a former Director General of Police S Jaffar Sait and T Udayakumar, proprietor of Landmark Construction, have been seized by Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a government plot allotment scam.
The ED initiated money laundering investigation on the basis of an FIR registered in 2011 by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) of Tamil Nadu against seven individuals.
The investigation revealed that plots were illegally allotted under the ‘Government Discretionary Quota (GDQ)‘ by I Periyasamy, the then Minister of Housing and Urban Development under former CM Karunanidhi’s regime.
The plot of the scam
A residential plot was allotted to the then IG (Intelligence) Jaffar Sait under the GDQ ignoring the fact that he was ineligible to benefit from the scheme, the ED alleged. Rajamanickam, who was the then secretary to former CM Karunanidhi, got the adjacent plot allotted to his son R Durgashankar, also in violation of the norms of GDQ, the ED charged.
“Parvin Jaffar and R Durgashankar entered into an agreement with Udayakumar of Land Mark Construction for joint development of the combined land in order to maximise the fruits of their crime,” the agency pointed out.
Udaykumar financed them despite knowing well that the allottees were not the owners as on the day of Joint Development Agreement, it added. The money received from Udayakumar, alleged the agency, was used by Parvin Jaffar and R Durgashankar to pay the cost of illegally allotted plots by Tamil Nadu Housing Board.
“Parvin Jaffar, R Durgashankar and T Udayakumar generated huge amount of proceeds of crime by way of building a multi-floor apartment on the said allotted plots and realised the money by way of selling the flats to general public,” the ED charged.