Gurugram: Retired IAS officer Ashok Khemka, known for his relentless stance against corruption, has stirred a fresh row with two social media posts questioning the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) chargesheet in the high-profile Skylight Hospitality-DLF land deal case.
Khemka, who shot to national prominence in 2012 upon cancelling the mutation of a 3.5-acre land deal in Gurugram between Skylight Hospitality—a company linked to Congress leader Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra—and realty major DLF, called ED’s probe a “shoddy investigation”.
In his two posts on X Sunday, Khemka also hinted at political patronage and a “sweetheart deal” that allegedly benefited influential figures.
“ED’s chargesheet in the DLF-Skylight deal is shoddy investigation. Why is the bribe giver not arraigned as accused? To unravel the sweetheart deal, investigate the quid pro quo. Public interest must not be compromised,” he wrote in the first post.
In a follow-up post, he added: “An officer who had recommended grant of license to the ineligible M/s Skylight in March, 2008 was later rewarded in 2015 with Chief Secretaryship and now continues in re-employment for the third time after retiring from the IAS. Harsh truth of public service.”
Khemka’s remarks have rekindled debate over the controversial land deal involving Skylight Hospitality, where Congress leader and Wayanad MP Priyanka Gandhi’s husband, Vadra, served as a director in February 2008.
ThePrint reached Khemka for further comments, but the former civil servant from Haryana, who now practices law in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, declined to elaborate beyond his X posts. “My comments are limited to what I have written in my posts. Everyone knows what these mean. I don’t want to elaborate on that,” Khemka told The Print.
A senior official, who has closely followed Khemka’s career for decades, said the former bureaucrat’s posts are a veiled reference to DLF.
“When a company pays Rs 58 crore for land purchased just hours earlier for Rs 7.5 crore, who else can be the bribe-giver mentioned by Khemka? Had DLF paid the market price for the land, it would have been a genuine deal. But paying over seven times the price for land acquired hours ago raises serious questions,” the officer said on condition of anonymity.
ThePrint reached DLF via email and WhatsApp messages to Divya Puri, senior vice president of Corporate Communications, and PR Professionals, the PR agency hired by DLF in Gurugram. This report will be updated if and when a response is received.
Also Read: ED files charge sheet against Robert Vadra in Shikohpur land deal case
The Skylight-DLF deal controversy
The case, according to ED’s prosecution complaint under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, stems from an FIR filed by Gurugram Police on 1 September, 2018 at Kherki Daula Police Station.
The FIR named Vadra, former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, DLF, Onkareshwar Properties Pvt Ltd, and others as accused, alleging offences under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, including Section 420 (cheating) and Section 423 (fraudulent execution of a deed of transfer).
According to ED’s chargesheet, Vadra’s Skylight Hospitality bought 3.5 acres of land in Shikohpur, Gurugram, from Onkareshwar Properties for Rs 7.5 crore in February 2008, when Hooda was chief minister and also held the portfolio of the Town and Country Planning Department.
The next day, the land’s mutation was entered in revenue records in the company’s favour and its title was reportedly transferred to Vadra within 24 hours. Later, in September 2012, Vadra’s firm sold the same land to DLF for a staggering Rs 58 crore.
The FIR further alleged a suspected quid pro quo transaction between the Hooda-led Congress government and DLF for purchasing the Vadra land at an inflated price.
ED’s case alleged irregularities in the transaction, including the manipulation of land records fraudulently to procure a commercial licence.
The agency’s chargesheet alleged that Skylight Hospitality’s application for a housing licence could not have been considered because it fell below the minimum mandatory acres.
According to the executive summary of the prosecution complaint filed by the ED—accessed by ThePrint—Skylight’s application stated that out of the 3.53 acres, only 1.35 acres were available for commercial licensing, below the minimum requirement of two acres.
However, officials at the Directorate of Town and Country Planning (DTCP) in Chandigarh allegedly included land designated for a sector road in it to facilitate the process, it said.
The complaint also said that statements from DTCP officials also revealed backdating and alterations to the sector road plan to make Skylight eligible for the licence.
“Statements from DTCP officials revealed pressure from higher authorities to accelerate the process. The file also showed backdating and alterations to the sector road plan to help M/s SLHPL qualify for the licence,” reads the ED’s complaint.
ED’s chargesheet also mentioned the haste with which Skylight’s file was cleared.
A detailed note by Gian Chand, an assistant in the Haryana town and country planning department, on 17 March, 2008, set the process in motion.
The file was subsequently processed by S.S. Dhillon, the director; D.S. Dhesi, the principal secretary of the department; and Chhattar Singh, the chief minister’s principal secretary all between 17 and 21 March that year. A Letter of Intent (LoI) was issued to Skylight Hospitality on 28 March, despite its ineligibility.
The ED chargesheet also pointed to potential stamp duty evasion. The sale deed for the Shikohpur land transaction claimed payment via cheque, when no such payment was made.
Khemka’s allegations of political patronage
Khemka’s second X post refers to an unnamed officer who, in March 2008, recommended the grant of a commercial licence to Vadra’s firm.
The officer quoted above told The Print that Khemka was referring to the then principal secretary of the town and country planning department, D.S. Dhesi, who served as chief secretary of Haryana under the BJP government.
Post-retirement, he has held multiple high-profile positions, including Chief Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, Chairman of the Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission (HERC), and currently Chief Adviser for Urban Development.
The post didn’t specify the nature of the quid pro quo.
The Print tried to reach Depinder Singh Dhesi via a call and text message for a comment on Khemka’s post. This report will be updated if and when a response is received.
The DLF Group had courted controversy after it became public that it had donated Rs 170 crore to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) through electoral bonds. The BJP was the sole recipient of these bonds, with DLF not donating to any other political party.
The Haryana government later gave a clean chit to the DLF case in this land deal in an affidavit in court.
On 19 April, 2023, the Haryana government submitted an affidavit to the Punjab and Haryana High Court, stating that revenue officials had found “no violation of rules” in the transfer of 3.5 acres of land by Robert Vadra’s Skylight Hospitality to DLF Universal Limited on 18 September, 2012. This submission was part of a “court on its own motion” public interest litigation concerning the monitoring of cases against current and former legislators.
The Khattar government later clarified that it was not a clean chit.
While this affidavit indicated that the transactional aspects of the land deal, such as stamp duty payment, were found to be in order by the Manesar tehsildar’s report, the Haryana government, through statements from its officials, including Home Minister Anil Vij, subsequently clarified that this was not a “clean chit” to all accused parties.
It emphasised that the broader investigation, led by a newly reconstituted Special Investigation Team (SIT) as of 22 March 2023, was still ongoing and aimed to uncover any criminal conspiracy or quid pro quo.
(Edited by Sugita Katyal)
Also Read: Ashok Khemka, whistleblower IAS officer transferred 57 times in 33 yrs, retires from service