Responding to a PIL seeking a CBI probe into the land scam in Ranchi, the Jharkhand High Court directed the Enforcement Directorate to submit a “ sealed report” on threat to life of his officials. 

 This order was passed by the division bench comprising bench headed by Chief Justice Sanjaya Kumar Mishra while hearing a PIL filed by Shiv Shankar Sharma for a probe into the land scam. 

 The court sought a sealed report regarding the illegal activities of two high-profile money laundering case accused- Prem Prakash and Amit Agarwal who were lodged in the Birsa Munda Central Jail, Ranchi. 

The PIL was filed by Shiv Shankar Sharma who has urged the court to get a probe conducted by CBI into the land scam. 

Right in beginning of the hearing, Sharma’s counsel Rajiv Kumar referred to various newspaper reports, saying how the “scamsters” behind the high walls of the jail were hatching a conspiracy to harm the ED officers and dilute the cases filed against them. 

 In response, the court asked ED counsel Amit Das to submit a report in this regard in a sealed cover for further action. 

 In fact, the ED had raided the Birsa jail premises recently after a report claimed that a conspiracy was being hatched to implicate officials of the ED in false cases. 

 The ED, thereafter, also summoned three jail officials, including Superintendent Hamid Akhtar and Jailor Md Nashim. The jail head clerk, Md Danish, is undergoing questioning following the ED summons today. 

The mobile phone of Danish was allegedly used to influence the ED witnesses. During the raid, information was reportedly received that a fresh conspiracy was hatched to implicate an ED officer “in a serious type of charge from inside the jail itself”. 

This pertained to a conspiracy to get the ED officer booked in ST- SC case at the Dhurva police station in Ranchi. According to sources, a woman was also persuaded by jail birds to file a case against ED officials, but the central agency managed to get the information at the right time. 

Many important facts and evidence have been collected by the ED in this case. Prem Prakash, Amit Agarwal, and many other prisoners involved in illegal mining and land scams had allegedly a role in this conspiracy, it is learnt. 

 The central probe agency is investigating money laundering worth crores of rupees in Jharkhand through land scams, illegal trade of sand, alleged scam in liquor tender and illegal mining.