VACB uncovers official-agent nexus facilitating unlawful conversion of wetlands, paddy fields for actual property growth

The Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB) has uncovered a well-entrenched racket involving actual property builders, brokers, and income officers who illegally convert paddy and wetland areas for development, together with suburban villas and gated communities, that are in excessive demand in Kerala’s booming housing market. 

On Friday (November 7, 2025), the VACB performed shock inspections at 27 Revenue Divisional Offices (RDOs) and in addition on the workplaces of 32 Deputy Collectors tasked with imposing the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act, 2008. 

Director, VACB, Manoj Abraham, authorised the operation code-named Haritha Kavacham after the anti-corruption company’s intelligence wing flagged the existence of a mafia, together with prison gangs that personal dumper truck fleets and use illegally mined earth to transform paddy fields into dry land for expensive development.

 Investigators mentioned the “agent-builder-realtor-official” nexus supplied cowl for the widespread environmental crime by legitimising the unlawful conversion. 

Procedures for land conversion to be simplified with out compromising paddy and wetland safety, says Rajan

They mentioned RDOs had been the racket’s hubs. The workplaces preserve the wetland paddy land information financial institution, an important digital file that identifies and categorises the character of the land inside their respective jurisdictions. 

The database clearly delineates wetlands and paddy lands, on which the legislation prohibits landfills or development. Field inspections, surveys, and satellite tv for pc imagery kind the premise of the database, which data the land’s standing as of the Act’s entry into pressure (2008).

Investigators mentioned the corruption begins when builders purchase giant tracts of wetland at comparatively low-cost costs, fill them with earth and apply for conversion to dry land. Some candidates fraudulently declare that the “dry land” was incorrectly marked as a wetland within the information financial institution. 

Officials mentioned that for sizeable backhanders, corrupt income officers and their brokers exempt the land from the wetland/paddy land information financial institution with out correct verification or discipline surveys. The nexus additionally tampers with the Basic Tax Register and categorises the unlawfully reclaimed wetland as “dry land” to facilitate unlawful actual property growth.  

The VACB randomly inspected scores of purposes, probably submitted by actual property builders, for exemption from the wetland information financial institution and reclassification as dry land. 

In Malappuram district, the VACB discovered that the cell phone contact quantity was the identical for 11 title deed holders who sought reclassification of their paddy fields as dry land. 

At the RDO workplace in Thaliparambu, Kannur, the VACB detected large-scale exemptions from the info financial institution for actual property growth. Mr. Abraham has directed the company to interact the Kerala Remote Sensing and Environmental Centre to detect unlawful paddy land conversions within the State. 

Officials mentioned the size of corruption concerned as enormous. In the RDO workplace at Muvattupuzha, Ernakulam, the VACB discovered unlawful transactions between actual property builders and income officers amounting to ₹17 lakhs on a given day.