Karnataka BJP corporator held on graft charge

BANGALORE - Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Bangalore corporator Katta Jagadish Naidu, the son of a state minister, was arrested Thursday by the Lokayukta (ombudsman) police on a graft charge.

Jagadish, who represents the upscale Vasantnagar ward in the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), is the son of IT and Housing Minister Katta Subramanya Naidu in the first BJP government in the southern state.

“Jagdish Naidu has been taken into custody under the Prevention of Corruption Act for attempting to influence a witness (Ramanujappa) by bribing him with Rs.100,000 in a land compensation scam,” senior official R.K.Dutta told reporters.

The Lok Ayukta police caught the corporator red-handed when he was handing over the cash to the witness in a bid to erase the evidence against him in the compensation scam.

“He is under detention under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and section 48 of the Prevention of Corruption Act. He will be produced in the court Friday,” Dutta said.

Jagadish has been accused of receiving around Rs.4 crore compensation from the state-run Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board (KIADB), which acquired 13 acres of land on the city’s outskirts that did not belong to him or his family but originally to a farmer Rangaswamy from Jala hobli.

The opposition Congress sought the suspension of Jagadish from the civic council as the KIADB served notice to him and his family to recover the compensation paid to them after irregularities in the land ownership came to light.