The state government has decided to form a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to put an end to shady deals and forceful possession by the mafia and notorious builders of land owned by villagers in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, especially Mira-Bhayandar.

The announcement was made by Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who also heads the home ministry after the issue was highlighted by BJP legislator Prashant Bamb during the ongoing monsoon session of the state assembly on Friday. The decision of appointing the SIT has sent shivers down the spine of the land mafia operating in Mira Bhayandar and Thane. To prove his point, Bamb raised the issue of a notorious land developer identified as Shyam Sunder Agarwal, who has been booked in 32 cases, mostly land related frauds in Mira Road, Bhayandar, Thane and Mumbai.

Agarwal, who is also accused of taking help of underworld gangsters to corner poor farmers and grab their property at throwaway prices, had shot to notoriety for his alleged involvement in the multi-crore Urban Land Ceiling Regulation Act (ULCRA) scam which was busted by the Thane crime branch in November, 2016.

The modus operandi

The modus operandi of the land mafia is carried out in a very planned and systematic manner. They would enter into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) or fraudulently obtain power of attorneys from the original owners to purchase land tracts by paying small amounts as advance money. When asked for the balance payment they would involve local goons and at times take help from underworld gangsters and local politicians to scare the seller and usurp the property.

Notably, five people, including a Mira Road-based goon (close associate of a local political leader) claiming to be members of the Chhota Shakeel gang had been arrested by the Mumbai police under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) for their involvement in similar activities. 

Local revenue officers facilitating fraudulent land transfers

Moreover, there are instances in which local talathi’s (revenue officers) have been booked for allegedly facilitating fraudulent land transfers on the virtue of impersonation and forging signatures of dead people at the behest of the land mafia in Uttan.

In March, this year, the Bhayandar police had registered an offence against three people including a talathi and two local developers on alleged charges of cheating and forgery to grab an ancestral land parcel belonging to a farmer’s family in Murdha village.

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