Bangalore, Sep 24 (IANS): Troubles mounted for former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda as a court Saturday ordered probe into his eldest son's assets while his another son and daughter-in-law are already battling graft cases.
The Lokayukta (ombudsman) court Judge N.K. Sudhindra Rao directed police to complete by Oct 10 probe into a complaint that Gowda's eldest son H.D. Balakrishne Gowda has amassed wealth disproportionate to his known sources of income.
Balakrishne Gowda was a Karnataka Administrative Service (KAS) officer and took voluntary retirement in 2005 after 21 years' service.
The complaint against him is that he has acquired assests worth Rs.500 crore. It has been filed by S.N. Balakrishna, a retired official of Visvesvaraya Iron and Steel Limited, Bhadravathi, about 250 km from Bangalore.
The complaint, filed Thursday, alleged that Balakrishne Gowda had acquired properties, commercial buildings and was running educational institutions in the name of his wife Kavitha and other relatives.
The probe against Balakrishne Gowda comes while his younger brother and former chief minister H.D.Kumarswamy and his legislator wife Anita Kumaraswamy are fighting graft cases in the Lokayukta court.
Kumaraswamy has been charged with illegally granting mining lease when he was the chief minister in 2006-07. He is also accused of illegally granting large tracts of land to a housing society in Bangalore. In return, the society gave allotted a huge house plot to Anita.
The couple has been granted anticipatory bail by the Karnataka High Court.