Berhampur, April 13: Police today registered yet another case against former Congress MLA Ramesh Jena for allegedly encroaching on endowment lands in Borigaon mouza in the district.
This is the 17th case that has been registered against Jena, whom the police arrested on March 4.
Police superintendent Ashis Singh today said a case was registered against Jena and four others for forcibly encroaching on a patch of 30-feet-wide and 80-feet-long land belonging to the Raghunath Mahaprabhu Trust in Borigaon under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Institution Prevention of Misuse Act, 1988. Sing said that the other accused are Arakhit Jena, Murali Rao, Buna Sahu and Kiran Panda.
The cops swung into action after the endowment department's managing trustee Kishore Chandra Patnaik had lodged the complaint against Jena and his associates.
The trust has 4.348 acres of endowment land and Jena forcibly occupied the 30-feet-wide and 80-feet-long area to build a road in order to facilitate his business. "We have to measure the encroached land to find out the exact amount and again interrogate him in this case. We would pray Sub-Divisional Judicial Magistrate Court for his remand for more days. The five-day remand period of Jena ended today," Singh said.
The police superintendent said he suspected that Jena had grabbed more endowment and other government lands in other places. The land records are being verified to find out possible encroachment by him and others at various places.
So far, 17 cases have been registered in Berhampur police district and three in Ganjam police district against Jena. He was arrested for owning illegal weapons. Subsequently, various cases of land encroachment, extortion and a case of rape were registered against him.
The police have interrogated Jena and a real estate builder Sai Patnaik face to face. "Sai had kept the deed papers, details of the land, agreement papers and other related documents concealed in two suitcases in the house of his neighbour Chotu Panigrahi, who is a mentally challenged person residing at Gandhi Nagar," Singh said.
