Karuna denies charges in allotment of land

Chennai: Rejecting charges of irregularities in allotment of land under discretionary quota, Chief Minister M Karunanidhi on Tuesday hit back at Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy for seeking sanction for his prosecution on the issue, saying he was trying to "twist facts".

A day after Swamy filed a petition with Governor Surjit Singh Barnala seeking sanction to prosecute Karunanidhi, the DMK patriarch made a submission in the Assembly, saying the discretionary quota was not 'DMK specific' and had been in vogue even during the tenures of AIADMK.

"Eighty five per cent of allotments were being made through draw of lots of applications for Tamil Nadu Housing Board lands and houses. The rest had been given under discretionary quota. The plots or houses under both categories had been given at the same price," Karunanidhi said. He said plots and houses had been given at market rate to both applicants and beneficiairies under discretionary quota.

The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister charged Swamy with trying to twist facts over the issue. TNHB fixed the price of the land or house based on current market value or the sub-registrar office guidelines, whichever was higher, he said.

Karunanidhi had on Sunday issued a legal notice to Swamy for dragging his name into the 2G spectrum allocation scam. Swamy had yesterday sought sanction for prosecution of Karunanidhi for alloting land "for a favoured few" under the

discretionary quota in alleged violation of relevant rules.

Karunanidhi said the system of discretionary quota was introduced by the AIADMK government in 1979 and a Government Order was then issued for this purpose.

Initially, 10 per cent of houses and plots were alloted under the discretionary quota, which was revised to 15 per cent by the AIADMK government during its 1991-96 rule, he said.

Reading out a list of beneficiaries alloted plots and houses during AIADMK regimes, he claimed it included IPS officials K Vijaykumar and R Nataraj.

Besides this, relatives of various AIADMK leaders,including Dr Banumathy, wife of Lok Sabha AIADMK MP, M Thambidurai, and son of AIADMK MLA and former minister K A Sengotaiyyan had been alloted land, he claimed.