In an interesting development in Andhra Pradesh these days, senior IAS officer and former CRDA commissioner Cherukuri Sridhar had turned into witness in the Amaravati land scam.
The IAS officer deposed before the AP CBCID, which is probing into the Amaravati land scam, that happened during the TDP rule from 2014 to 2019.
He told the police that the government had collected the revenue records of Thulluru mandal in 2014 October, even before the land pooling for the capital was started in January 2015.
The land records were not returned to the Thulluru MRO but were kept at the Guntur collectorate, he told the investigating officials.
Later, when the Capital Region Development Authority (CRDA) was formed, a group of ministers meeting was held with the then CRDA commissioner N Srikanth, Guntur district Collector Kantilal Dande and others.
Cherukuri Sridhar, who succeeded Srikanth as CRDA commissioner also told the police that the government with then Minister P Narayana, tried to take over the assigned lands from the poor.
He said he had raised objections as taking assigned lands was against the Assigned Lands Act 1977.
However, the Minister and the government did not entertain his caution, the IAS officer told the police.
The revelations of Cherukuri Sridhar in the land pooling gives new twist to the cases filed against then TDP leaders, besides the insider trading.
It is now to be seen what the Jagan Mohan Reddy government do as Cherukuri Sridhar revealed the story behind land pooling.