Advocate K.N. Jagadeesh Kumar, a Delhi High Court lawyer, has alleged that he received threats to withdraw his complaint against Kerala BJP president Rajeev Chandrasekhar in connection with an alleged land scam involving the Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board (KIADB).
In his petition, Jagadeesh Kumar accused the KIADB of irregularities in allotting 175 acres of farmland to BPL India Ltd. in 1995 for setting up a colour television, tube, and battery manufacturing unit at Nelamangala in Dobbaspet.
The land, acquired from farmers at ₹1.1 lakh per acre, was handed over to the company through a possession certificate issued in May 1995 and a registered lease deed in April 1996.
However, the petition states that no industrial development took place at the site until 2004. The land was later mortgaged to the Bank of Bahrain and Kuwait with KIADB’s permission and eventually converted into an absolute sale in 2006.
The petitioner further alleged that BPL India subsequently sold major portions of the allotted land to prominent industrial players, including 87.32 acres to Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. in February 2011 for ₹275.47 crore, 33 acres and 14 guntas to Maruti Suzuki in 2009–10 for ₹31 crore, 3 acres and 36.83 guntas to BOC India Ltd. in 2011 for ₹4 crore, and 25 acres and 5.5 guntas to Jindal Aluminium Ltd. in 2011 for ₹33.5 crore.
Jagadeesh Kumar’s formal appeal, addressed to Karnataka’s Commerce and Industries Minister M.B. Patil and Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda, sought the formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the alleged large-scale irregularities in KIADB’s land allotments.
The complaint named BPL India, Ajit Gopal Nambiar, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Anjali Rajeev Chandrasekhar, and former minister Katta Subramanya Naidu.
Rajeev Chandrasekhar is married to Anju Chandrasekhar, daughter of T.P.G. Nambiar, the founder of the BPL Group.
Meanwhile, Bengaluru-headquartered electronics company BPL Limited has strongly denied the allegations and recent media reports on the issue.
In a statement, the company dismissed attempts to link Kerala BJP chief Rajeev Chandrasekhar to the controversy as “politically motivated and false,” clarifying that he has no financial or official connection with BPL.
The petitioner also highlighted wider concerns over KIADB’s functioning, alleging that the agency has acquired over 1.55 lakh acres of farmland in the past 55 years, of which more than 70% has not been used for genuine industrial purposes.
Instead, he claimed, the lands were diverted under the pretext of industrial development, leading to large-scale real estate and farmland scams.
The case comes amid growing public scrutiny of KIADB’s practices, following farmer protests in Devanahalli over forced land acquisitions and controversies surrounding caste-based land reservation policies.
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