Mr Sujit Banerjee, IAS Secretary, Central Vigilance Commission

Sub: Complaint against DDA Chief Engineer (SW)

Dear Sir,

We are enclosing (encl.1) our letter to LG about press quotes of officials, including Mr R K Sood, DDA CE(SW), about projects sub-judice in WP 85232/2003 in which authorities have not filed reply since notice of 22.09.2004 and work is in full swing.

Mr R K Sood has been quoted on the Sultangarhi project, into which a vigilance inquiry into tendering was initiated in 2002 at the instance of Mr Mahabal Mishra, MLA. The project had started without mandatory Master Plan modification and CGWA clearance and Hon’ble High Court had ordered it stopped and inquired into in judgment of 16.09.2002 in WP 4978/2002. In response to Public Notice of 15.09.2002 for land use change over 1700 families in the area filed objections. CGWA had already expressed its reservations in letters that were part of the pleadings. The inquiry ordered by the court (to prevent perpetuation of identical illegalities) was not initiated and in December 2003 we moved court against a identically illegal projects, including Sultangarhi on which there was sporadic work and several announcements. The Court issued notice on 22.09.2004 and work on Sultangarhi resumed in November and has now reached third floor level. Of several letters about it, the one of 22.11.2004, also copied to CVC, forwarded by GNCTD to DDA and MCD is at encl.2 and it is in the context of its contents that we find Mr Sood’s remark amounting to trivializing the court’s order and suspect.

Mr Sood was in charge of the project in 2002 as SE(SW) and we had even then sought a vigilance inquiry against him vide letter of 27.10.2002 (encl.3). Subsequently he was involved in removal of earth from the site (which appears to be standard side-business in projects in the area, connected to filling in illegal private projects, such as of the water body to make a parking lot for Sahara Restaurant of the DDA scam fame and, currently, of forest area for unauthorized colony near GNCTD Mandi, also challenged in our WP 8523/2003, at Andheria Morh). In one instance of earth removal from Sultangarhi we were able to get the local police to impound trucks at night, but these were released next morning, letter of 27.04.2003 about which is at encl.4.

Mr Sood is also considered “close” to new chairman of Federation of RWAs. On 05.01.2005, when Parliamentary Standing Committee visited Vasant Kunj, an interaction was arranged by DDA / Mr Sood, to which only select RWAs were invited (by the area councilor). Reversing the stand taken by the Federation under the former chairman in its Public Notice response, the present chairman “suggested” the Sultangarhi project, already under construction, to the Standing Committee.

We do not know if this worthy of CVC’s intervention, but since the outcome of the vigilance inquiry into the mega-housing tendering scam is also not known and the project has been resumed, with obvious confidence on part of Mr Sood, we would like to bring this to your attention.

We specifically request confidentiality. Yours sincerely

Gita Dewan Verma, MPISG Planner