The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) on Friday arrested more than 15 people, including former JD(S) MLA from Belur, K.S. Lingesh, and two former tahsildars, in connection with a case involving alleged irregularities in the sanctioning of land to bagair hukum cultivators in Belur taluk of Hassan district.

Bagair hukum refers to the cultivation of government land without formal sanction from the administration. The two arrested tahsildars have been identified as Mohan Kumar and Putta Shetty. A CID source told The Hindu that there are nearly 30 accused in the case, and the State investigation agency has launched a search operation to trace the remaining suspects.

“The accused include revenue officers and former Legislative Council members. Many of them are dead now,” the CID officer said. According to officials, the scam is believed to have taken place between January 2013 and January 2023 and involves nearly 1,700 acres of land.

Mr. Lingesh was the head of the Bagair Hukum Committee, or the Committee for Regularisation of Unauthorised Occupations, in Belur when he served as the MLA of the constituency. Usually, the local MLA heads the committee, which includes tahsildars as members.

The case was originally registered at the Belur police station following a complaint filed by an RTI activist from Kolar. The allegation is that the committee allotted government land to non-existent beneficiaries, causing massive losses to the government and amounting to fraud. Mr. Lingesh is accused of authorising the illegal allotment of land to fictitious beneficiaries.

However, the investigation was stayed for a period. After the stay was recently vacated, the CID launched its probe. Following this, the agency prepared a list of people believed to be involved and carried out a series of arrests. “There are more people whom we are searching for. None of them had obtained anticipatory bail, while some had sought to have the case quashed. However, the case was not quashed,” the officer said.

Earlier, Mr. Lingesh had dismissed the allegations and said, “During my tenure, I cleared files relating to 720 acres, and the beneficiaries numbered 562. All of them are residents of Belur taluk. No outsider was sanctioned on the land, as alleged in the complaint.”