NEW DELHI, 7 May 2005 — The Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) yesterday conducted raids at 33 places all over the country in connection with two disproportionate asset cases registered against government officials, including Delhi Income Tax Commissioner B. Meena.

The raids were being conducted at New Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta, Jaipur, Port Blair, Pondichery and Alwar (Rajasthan), CBI sources said here.

A disproportionate assets case has been registered against B. Meena, a 1980 batch Indian Revenue Services (IRS) batch officer.

The second case pertains to a land scam in Andaman and Nicobar Islands where four officials and two employees of a private company were booked by CBI for allegedly entering into criminal conspiracy and causing loss to the state exchequer.

Those booked include V. Kanduellu, a 1997 batch IAS officer presently posted as collector, land revenue, S.A. Awardy, a Danics officer, Ramachandran, a retired Danics officer, Srinivas, an executive engineer and Harish Khaitna, CMD and A.N. Chingapa, assistant general manager of Calcutta-based Andaman Timber Company.

In its FIR, CBI alleged that two decades back, large tracts of land were leased to the concerned company which were later allegedly acquired by the accused from the company and used for personal purposes.

On the other hand, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), yesterday demanded a CBI probe into the deals entered into by the erstwhile NDA government in the sale of two Centaur hotels in Bombay saying it was an “open and shut case” for such a probe.

Observing that the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report, tabled in Parliament yesterday, had also raised “serious objections”, party leader Nilotpal Basu told reporters here that “it is an open and shut case for an immediate CBI inquiry ... Lot of prima facie evidence has already piled up”.

“The finance minister had told the house that he was awaiting the CAG report. Now since it has been tabled in Parliament, we hope he will respond on Monday”, he said.

He said the Standing Committee on Transport and Tourism in March 2003 had recommended an inquiry into the airport Centaur Hotel deal.

However, in the action taken report on the matter, the NDA government had stated that there was “no discrepancy in the transaction” and therefore no need for an inquiry, Basu said adding, “by doing so, the then NDA government gave a clean chit to itself”.

Describing the stand of BJP MP Arun Shourie, who was then the disinvestment minister as “hypocritical”, Basu said the CAG report now has questioned the property valuations of the hotels, the transaction which was a “single bid case”, fixation of the reserve price not being consistent with other such cases and on other counts.

The CPI(M) leader said the party had been seeking a CBI inquiry for quite some time now and hoped that the government would agree to the demand.