THE KHALAPUR LAND SYNDICATE: How Agrarian Fields Are Sliced Into Illegal Plots While Revenue Officials Look Away.

THE KHALAPUR LAND SYNDICATE: How Agrarian Fields Are Sliced Into Illegal Plots While Revenue Officials Look Away.

A massive multi-crore land scam is unfolding along the booming Panvel-Khalapur growth corridor. Highly protected agricultural fields and ecologically fragile green zones are being aggressively carved up into illegal residential plots.

Our deep-dive investigation into MSRDC Layout File BP-542 exposes a textbook operational design of a land syndicate. The setup relies heavily on benami frontmen, financial fragmentation (smurfing), and a calculated breakdown of the local revenue machinery.

At the absolute center of this investigation is a critical question of systemic accountability: Why are the Raigad District Collector, the local Tehsildar, and the Sub-Registrar allowing an unregistered, unapproved megaproject to operate openly right under their noses?

The investigative documentation spans 187 pages across seven hidden files. The records expose how the corporate entity, Riyasat Infra Developers Pvt Ltd (MD: Sumer Singh Saini), orchestrates transactions on land it does not legally own.

Official 7/12 land records for the core Nadhal village parcels (Survey/Gut Numbers 145/4, 146/2, 146/6/A, 152/1) show the property is held under the name of an outside individual, Mr. Atul Swadeshpal Bhatia (Breach Candy, Mumbai).

Title search reports confirm that no registered Development Agreement or Power of Attorney (POA) exists between Bhatia and Riyasat Group. Yet, Riyasat Group is actively accepting public bookings under its corporate seal (Annexure-D).

This is a classic benami property web designed to mask the real ownership, evade stamp duty, and shield the real corporate beneficiaries.

A scam of this scale cannot exist without the structural failures of local land administrators. Under the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code (MLRC), 1966, the responsibility to halt this illegality stops directly at the desks of three key officials:

The Tehsildar is the primary custodian of land use within the Taluka.

The Lapse: Developers are physically operating heavy machinery, flattening land, and building roads across agricultural plots in Nadhal, Takegaon (S.No. 51/5, 51/8, 51/9, 52/1), and Panshil (S.No. 70/3/A/1, 90).

The Legal Duty: Under Section 44 of the MLRC, agricultural land cannot be split or modified without a formal Non-Agricultural (NA) conversion order. The Tehsildar has failed to issue a summary stop-work notice or register a First Information Report (FIR) for the blatant unauthorized use of agrarian land.

The Mutation Discrepancy: The Tehsildar’s office certified Ferfar No. 2339 in March 2023, just ten days before the developers used it to rush files into MSRDC. This indicates an alarming level of speed and alignment between the registry desk and the developer’s agents

The Lapse: The Sub-Registrar’s office is legally bound to verify the title and structural permissions before allowing property deeds to process. By turning a blind eye to the lack of a MahaRERA registration and missing NA orders, this office is actively allowing the fractionalization of agricultural plots into illegal sub-divided layouts.

As the District Magistrate and head of the revenue administration, the Collector holds ultimate statutory responsibility.

Environmental Blindness: In Village Takegaon, the developer obtained a highly questionable internal permission (Javak Vanagam/1173/2023-24) under Section 25(2) of the MLRC to clear 107 Halalya trees. The clearance conditions explicitly banned tree cutting within 30 meters of any water body and mandated a double-plantation drive before the 2024 monsoon.

The Collector’s Failure: The developer completely ignored these environmental conditions, cleared natural green cover, and expanded the layout footprint past 50,000 square meters without seeking the mandatory Environmental Clearance (EC) under EIA 2006.

The Collector has failed to deploy a circle officer to inspect the site, seal the illegal sales offices, or issue a public cautionary notice to protect citizens from buying into a frozen asset.

The marketing machinery for “Riyasat Bliss” and “Riyasat Sankalp” continues to push materials claiming a “100% MSRDC Sanctioned Layout.”

Our investigation reveals this is an absolute misrepresentation. The file lacks a valid Commencement Certificate (CC) under Section 45 of the MRTP Act, lacks an NA order, and has zero registration with MahaRERA.

Any citizen investing hard-earned money into these plots is walking directly into a legal trap. They will be left holding pieces of land with un-transferable titles, tied up in pending multi-agency fraud investigations.

The Media Foundation has filed comprehensive, evidence-backed statutory complaints with the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for money laundering, the Income Tax Benami Prohibition Unit, and MahaRERA.

If the Raigad District Collector and the Tehsildar fail to exercise their statutory powers to issue a formal revenue freeze and halt on-site bookings within 7 days, this entire investigative dossier will be tabled directly before the Hon’ble Bombay High Court via a Public Interest Litigation (PIL).

The administrative officials who chose to overlook this blatant land grab will be named as direct parties to the case. Watch this space as EX7 News continues to track every file, every UTR number, and every compromised official in this syndicate.