Hyderabad: In a massive land scam involving 693 acres of government land in prime Miyapur area, the Cyberabad police on Sunday arrested the sub-registrar of Kukatpally, who illegally transferred it to private companies.

The directors of two companies — PVS Sharma, 72, director of Goldstone Infratech and PS Parthasarathi, director of Trinity Infraventures Ltd were also arrested. The trio was produced before a court on Monday and were remanded to 14 days judicial custody on Monday. They were shifted to Cherlapally jail.

Before being shifted to jail, Srinivas Rao told the media that he did not commit any wrong in registering the lands. “There is no scam at all,” he said.

Meanwhile, the state government has initiated measures to conduct a thorough inquiry into the Miyapur land scam and similar such cases. Srinivas Rao has been working at the same office for a long time now and he managed to get the transfers cancelled several times before.

Police said they will file a petition for the custody of the accused for further investigation.

Kukatpally Sub-Registrar Rachakonda Srinivasa Rao had allegedly taken crores of rupees in bribes from the private companies to transfer land situated in Miyapur village in Serilingampally mandal, to the two companies at cheap prices, causing a loss of Rs587 crore to the government. According to an estimate, the price of the land in the open market would be around Rs1,000 crore.

Police are zeroing in on other officials of the companies, including a politically well-connected employee of Goldstone Infrastructure, for their role in the scam.

The investigation has revealed that the Deputy Collector of Serilingampally had issued a memo in 2007 stating that the land in Miyapur village was government land/poramboku land. "There were many legal disputes going on in court regarding this land. In 2011, the deputy collector wrote to the sub-registrar again, stating that the land belonged to the government. PS Parthasarathi of Trinity Intraventures and others prepared a GPA from the various petitioners who had filed a case in the court and executed a deed in favour of Suvishal Power Gen Ltd. Sub-Registrar Srinivas Rao helped the accused to transfer the land," said Madhapur DCP Vishwa Prasad.

The police said that the suspects only paid Rs68 lakh for the land which is actually worth Rs587 crore. Mr Rao has allegedly been using the bribe money for international tours. "This year, he visited Australia. We are verifying where he went to blow up the money," said a senior official.

Rao is also suspected to be possessing huge properties and unaccounted for wealth. Officials said the Anti-Corruption Bureau is likely to step in and investigate his wealth and assets.

Kukatpally police started the investigation against Srinivas Rao on a complaint filed by district registrar N. Saidi Reddy.