Papers surface alleging land grab by Deve Gowda family

Mtoday news

Bangalore, Nov 26: HD Kumaraswamy, the JD(S) leader who has been exposing scandal after scandal involving chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, is now in the dock for helping his brother Balakrishne Gowda grab prime land in Bangalore.

Documents surfaced in Bangalore on Wednesday showing the gifting of prime land to Kupendra Reddy, who in turn sold part of the property to former prime minister HD Deve Gowda’s son Balakrishne Gowda.

The Bangalore edition of Deccan Chronicle reports:

* In 2007, then chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy who has been crying foul over BSY’s largesse to his kith and kin, granted an absolute sale deed to an extent of 28 acres of prime land belonging to KIADB on the bustling Sarjapur Outer Ring Road for a mere Rs 14 crore. Its market value today — Rs 850 crore.

* Less than two months later, HDK’s brother and other members of the former chief minister’s family received a portion of this very property at a throw away price. Today, Accenture operates out of this office space.

According to documents available with Deccan Chronicle, the prime beneficiary in this deal is H.D. Balakrishne Gowda (HDK’s brother) who has got 25,000 sqft of built up office space for a mere Rs 3.08 crore at less than Rs 1,200 per sqft whereas the value at that time was Rs 4,000 per sqft of built up structure.

H D Kumaraswamy may now have to eat his words. A set of documents available with Deccan Herald reveals that his family members, indeed, have  connections with the city-based realtor D Kupendra Reddy, whose house was raided by the I-T department on Tuesday…

A day after the I-T raids, Mr Kumaraswamy had fumed at media reports that Mr Reddy was close to him and stoutly denied any connection with the realtor. The documents also reveal that the entire commercial space sold to Kavitha (Kumaraswamy’s sister-in-law) and her family members was originally owned by State-owned Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board.

Three years on, when the case surfaced again this Wednesday, Kumaraswamy told TV9 that Reddy had got the land from the industrial area development board when S M Krishna was chief minister. He claimed he had no knowledge of the deal involving his brother Balakrishne Gowda.

Earlier in the day, Kumaraswamy said the BJP had acted immorally by letting scandal-tainted Yeddyurappa stay on as chief minister. He said he would take out a yatra in Karnataka to draw the people’s attention to Yeddyurappa’s “misdeeds.” Panchayat elections are due in the state in a month.