Illegal madrasa construction: Case against 3 municipal officials in Kasaragod

Kasaragod: The Kasaragod town police booked three officials of the Local Self-Government Department (LSGD) for allegedly helping a madrasa owner regularise the illegal construction at his religious school in Kasaragod's Thalangara. Police slapped cheating and forgery charges against the officials. The case was registered on a complaint filed by Justin P A, former secretary of Kasaragod Municipality.

Kasaragod Town Police identified the officials as Kasaragod Municipality's section clerk Pramod Kumar, revenue inspector Ranjith and former revenue officer A P George, who is now a junior superintendent at LSGD's Joint Director's Office in Ernakulam.

Earlier on December 9, Kasaragod Town police booked Shihab, the civil contractor of the madrasa, and his unnamed accomplice, for allegedly assaulting, abusing and threatening Justin on December 6. According to Justin, he was attacked because he served a memo to George after finding that he had helped the madrasa owner K H Salim regularise the illegal construction. Though Justin named George and Salim in his assault complaint to the District Police Chief, the Town Police had named only Shihab in the FIR registered on December 9.

After the assault, LSGD shifted Justin to the Kasaragod Collectorate where he is the project director of the department's Poverty Alleviation Unit.

On December 12, he filed another complaint against Pramod Kumar, Ranjith and George for forgery.

Justin said he, as the municipal secretary, gave a partial occupancy permit to Salim's madrasa to build a 580 m² (6243 sq ft) block above the existing school building.

Later, he found out that the madrasa file had an occupancy permit with an area of 892.9 m² (9611 sq ft) and his forged signature on the certificate.

"I named section clerk Pramod Kumar in my complaint because he works in the municipality's engineering section that handled the file related to the occupancy permit," Justin told Onmanorama. The file then moves to the Revenue Division for assigning a building number, with Revenue Inspector Ranjith responsible for scrutinising it. "He attested the file generated by the clerk and recommended assigning a building number. Finally, George, as the Revenue Officer, issued the order sanctioning the occupancy permit," Justin said.

The process flow of the file was accurate, but it contained a forged signature of the secretary. "I don’t know who forged my signature. That is for the police to uncover. However, the forgery occurred somewhere between these three desks," he said.

The Town police invoked Sections 318(4) (cheating over poverty), 336(2) (forgery); 336(3) (forging documents); and 337 (forging government records) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita against the three officials.