A district court in Bhuj town, Gujarat, on Saturday (April 19, 2025), sentenced former IAS officer Mr. Pradeep Sharma, a 1984-batch Gujarat cadre officer, to five years of rigorous imprisonment in connection with a 2011 case involving irregularities in the allotment of government land to a private company.
The court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Mr. J.V. Buddha in Bhuj held Mr. Sharma guilty along with urban planner Mr. Natubhai Desai, then mamlatdar Mr. Narendra Prajapati, and then resident deputy collector Mr. Ajitsinh Zala. Each of the four convicts has been sentenced to five years in prison and fined Rs. 10,000 for causing loss to the public exchequer through illegal land dealings.
The case relates to the illegal allotment of government land to Saw Pipes Pvt. Ltd. in 2004, during Mr. Sharma’s tenure as Kutch district collector. The prosecution argued that Mr. Sharma bypassed regulations and exceeded his authority to allocate land exceeding the permissible limit of two hectares without securing approval from the State government. This move was in violation of a Revenue Department resolution dated June 6, 2003, which allowed collectors to allot only up to two hectares of land for industrial use.
Importantly, the court noted that Mr. Sharma’s new sentence will begin after he completes a separate five-year sentence handed down by a sessions court in Ahmedabad earlier this year, on January 20, in connection with a 2004 corruption case.
A First Information Report (FIR) in the land allotment case was registered in 2011 by the CID Crime Rajkot zone under IPC Sections 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servants), 120B (criminal conspiracy), and 217 (public servant disobeying law with intent to save a person).
Mr. Sharma was arrested on March 4, 2011. Special Public Prosecutor Mr. H.B. Jadeja informed the court that the verdict was based on 52 documentary evidences and the testimonies of 18 prosecution witnesses.
The prosecution asserted that Mr. Sharma and the other officials acted in collusion during the District Land Valuation Committee meetings, conspiring to illegally benefit the private company at the expense of public funds.
