The Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Rohan Harmalkar on Wednesday under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), identifying him as the mastermind behind a Rs1,000 crore land-grab scam in Goa. Harmalkar allegedly defrauded property owners by impersonation, forging documents, and manipulating revenue records to illegally sell prime properties without owners’ consent.
Harmalkar, who unsuccessfully contested the 2022 Goa Assembly elections from Cumbarjua as an independent candidate before joining the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), orchestrated the forgery of sale deeds and impersonation of legitimate heirs to unlawfully transfer ownership of high-value land parcels.
According to the ED, he counterfeited government stamps and presented forged documents as genuine to illegally acquire properties. The scam primarily involved land in tourist hotspots such as Anjuna, Arpora, and Asagoan in Bardez Taluka.
Last week, the ED conducted extensive searches across multiple locations in Goa, seizing documents related to properties valued at Rs1,000 crore. The recovered forged title deeds reveal large-scale manipulation of land records and fraudulent transfers spanning several lakh square meters.
A PMLA court has remanded Harmalkar to ED custody for 14 days as investigations continue into the sprawling scam.
