Lucknow, Apr 25 (PTI) The Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court has directed the CBI to conduct a preliminary inquiry within four months into the allegations that a piece of land of the irrigation department in Ahimamau locality here was encroached upon by a builder.

The bench also directed the CBI to furnish before it the progress report of the preliminary inquiry every month and fixed the next hearing on May 5.

Also Read | Japanese Moon Landing Spacecraft’s Fate Unknown.

A bench of Justice D K Singh passed the order on a petition moved by B K Sinha.

"This court believes that since high officials would be involved in allowing such a big encroachment by an influential person, a fair investigation may not be possible by the local police and, therefore, a preliminary inquiry in the said respect should be conducted by the CBI/SIT, especially constituted for this purpose," the bench observed.

Also Read | Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath Seeks Details of Vacant Posts in State SIT.

It is alleged that the builder later sold the land to someone who raised a school building on it.

Due to interference of the court, the school building was demolished recently by the government. The court has directed the irrigation department to clear the debris from the site.

The bench also asked the irrigation department, the Lucknow Development Authority (LDA) and the housing and urban development department to provide relevant documents to the CBI for the probe.

As a vigilance inquiry is already going on in the matter, the court also said that the report of the vigilance department would be provided to the CBI.

The bench also directed the irrigation department to recover damages from the encroachers as per law.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)