2 booked, 2 axed for forest road row

BHUBANESWAR: The state government has filed FIRs against two persons and suspended equal number of employees in connection with construction of the controversial road leading to the plot of BJD heavyweight Kalpataru Das' MLA son Pranab Balabantray. The plot is situated at Ghangapatna village on the outskirts of the city.
"Bhubaneswar tahsildar has lodged FIRs against Mahendra Dehury and Sushant Behera at the Chandaka police station in this connection," collector (Khurda) Niranjan Sahu told the media here on Saturday.The complaint has also urged police to probe if more persons are involved in laying the road, he said.
The collector said the government also suspended revenue inspector (Paikarapur) Basant Swain and clerk at Khurda sub-collector's office Niranjan Das for their complicity in the illegalities. "We are verifying official records to ascertain possible involvement of other officers. Anyone found guilty will not be spared," he said. Government sources said some more persons are likely to be booked in the case soon.
The government had last week announced that those, who constructed the road on chhota jungle' and parbat kisam' would be booked for criminal trespass. The forest and environment department will take separate action for violation of Section 2 of Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980, against the erring officials and people involved.
Construction of the road leading to the lawmaker's plot along with allegations of land grab in the area by ruling party politicians and bureaucrats had snowballed into a major controversy. The state government on August 28 ordered a Crime Branch probe after a departmental inquiry by Khurda collector pointed out over 76 acre government land have been grabbed.
Opposition political parties see the government action as a knee-jerk reaction to the scam which would lead to no where.
"Instead of taking action against the lower-level officials, the government should order a CBI probe to unravel the truth and fix responsibility at the highest level," said leader of opposition Narasingha Mishra.