A report by Navbharat Times – Noida says the Enforcement Directorate questioned three Noida Authority employees until late Monday night in connection with the long-running Maharishi Ashram land transaction case. The report alleges that the investigation is examining the sale of nearly 3,000 bighas of land between 2019 and 2023 and the construction of flats, villas and unauthorised colonies on the parcels.
The report says the three employees were taken into custody by an ED team on Monday evening and questioned until midnight. It does not include an ED statement, a summons, a remand document or a named official confirmation explaining the status of the questioning. These details therefore require confirmation from the agency or relevant court records before they can be treated as established facts.
According to the report, the land under investigation was allegedly sold by land intermediaries and colonisers for amounts running into billions of rupees. The article links the alleged transactions to the development of residential projects and unauthorised colonies. It does not provide survey numbers, title documents, names of the alleged sellers or buyers, the exact location and extent of the land, or details of any registered case connected with the transactions.
The report further alleges that complaints were repeatedly submitted to the Noida Authority but that responsible officials failed to act. It attributes claims of commissions and ownership interests in known and benami properties to unnamed sources. No complaint copies, departmental findings, property records or statements from the officials named in connection with the alleged inaction are included in the supplied material.
The reported case is significant because land conversion and unauthorised construction in the Noida region involve more than private property disputes. They can affect planning controls, building permissions, public infrastructure capacity and the legal position of homebuyers who purchase units in developments later found to have approval or title problems. Establishing those impacts in this case would require access to land records, sanctioned plans, enforcement notices and project-level approvals, none of which are provided in the report.
The article says the financial investigation is examining money flows and that the Income Tax Department’s investigation wing has been assisting the ED. It claims the tax authorities had monitored the network for six months. The report does not identify the officers involved, cite a formal inter-agency communication or disclose the financial records being examined.
It also describes an alleged late-night movement of a senior official and two employees after a superior officer reportedly instructed an officer to leave the office. This account is attributed to the report’s sources and is not supported in the supplied material by a named witness, official record, video evidence or statement from the people involved.
The central questions for verification are whether the ED conducted the reported questioning, whether the three employees were formally detained or merely asked to appear, which land parcels are covered by the investigation, and whether any case has been registered against officials, intermediaries or developers. Confirmation of those details from the ED, the Noida Authority, the Income Tax Department or court documents is necessary before the allegations can be reported as confirmed findings.
