In 2010, the Indian media brought to public the alleged violations of rules at various phases of construction in the Adarsh Society. Questions were raised on the manner in which apartments in the building were allocated to bureaucrats, politicians and army personnel who had nothing to do with Kargil War and the way in which clearances were obtained for the construction of the building of the Adarsh Society.
Adarsh Housing Society was originally supposed to be a six-storey building that would house Kargil war heroes and widows. But the building ended up being a 31-storey tower.The high-rise, built on 6,450 sq metres within the Colaba naval area. But no one knows how army gave the permission to build a housing society on this land. It was exposed that Mumbai's posh Colaba area land (about 3800 square meters) with the complicity of military officers was given to a private housing society. But army took no action in this regard because several army officials, including former army Chief Deepak Kapoor himself, had flats in this society.
However, the houses in the society were allotted to senior army commanders, a former environment minister, legislators and bureaucrats.The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the Income Tax Department and the Enforcement Directorate(ED) are in the process of investigating allegations that three former chief ministers, Sushilkumar Shinde, Vilasrao Deshmukh and Ashok Chavan of the state of Maharashtra were also involved in the scam. Another issue that remains to be addressed is the ownership of the land. It is yet to be clarified whether the defence or the state revenue department owns it.
Mumbai collector Chandrashekhar Oke, had submitted a preliminary report on the same.The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has also been scrutinising how defence land was transferred to the Adarsh co-operative housing society and how the beneficiaries, including former services chiefs, politicians and bureaucrats, raised money to buy apartments meant for Kargil war heroes and their families. The Army High Command has ordered to find out how did the defence personnel managed to buy flats worth Rs 8-10 crores, considering their salaries. Some 40 officers are likely to be linked to the scam.
