Haryana drops chargesheet against IAS officer who took on Vadra

In a relief to senior Indian Administrative Service officer Ashok Khemka, Haryana’s Bharatiya Janata Party government has dropped the chargesheet against him in which he had been charged by the previous Congress regimes with exceeding his jurisdiction as he had cancelled the mutation of a land deal between a firm owned by Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra and realty major DLF.

The chargesheet against the 1991-batch officer has been dropped on the directive of the Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, official sources said on Wednesday.

The order for dropping the chargesheet was issued by the chief secretary’s office on Tuesday, they said, adding a communication was being sent to Khemka as well.

Khemka had been chargesheeted by the previous Hooda government, which had accused him of exceeding his jurisdiction by cancelling the mutation of the land deal over three years back between Skylight Hospitality, owned by Vadra, and DLF. It contained some other charges also.

The seven-page chargesheet was issued to him in December 2013 and the officer had submitted his reply to the state government earlier this year. He was also given a personal hearing by Chief Minister Khattar recently.

However, Khemka, who is currently posted as secretary and director general, archaeology and museums department, Haryana government, in a tweet wrote, “No information from government on decision in chargesheet issued on 4th Dec 2013. Media story is sweet music to my ears.”