ED Summons Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren in Land-Grabbing Case

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has issued a summons to Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, directing him to appear before the agency on August 24 in connection with a land-grabbing case. Soren had initially been asked to join the probe on August 14 but sought additional time. Earlier, he and his wife were questioned by the ED for approximately 10 hours at their Ranchi office in relation to an illegal mining case. In the ongoing land-grabbing investigation, the ED has already arrested 13 individuals, including an IAS officer.

The agency conducted a raid on July 8 at the residence of Soren’s legislator representative Pankaj Mishra, where a checkbook linked to the Chief Minister’s bank account was discovered, leading to his involvement in the case. Notably, the accused used documents dating back to 1932 to wrongfully seize land, falsely claiming that the victims’ properties had been sold by their ancestors.

These fraudulent actions involved land leased to the army, which was then illicitly sold to third parties. The ED seized numerous fake deeds from the suspects, and a forensic examination revealed that all the documents were forged, often using district names that did not exist prior to independence and outdated PIN codes from the 1970s. The case’s scope extends beyond Jharkhand to Bihar and Kolkata, and it also involves allegations of aiding IAS officer Chhavi Ranjan, who was subsequently arrested by the ED.