Allahabad (UP), Aug.24 (ANI): The Allahabad High Court on Monday directed the Uttar Pradesh government not to take any coercive action against three former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers who were allegedly involved in a multi-crore rupee Noida hotel land scam.

A two-judge bench of the high court, comprising Justices Ravindra Singh and Y C Gupta passed the order while hearing writ petitions filed by former NOIDA Authority chairman Rakesh Bahadur, former Meerut Commissioner Devdutt and former NOIDA Authority CEO Sanjeev Saran. ll three officers had been suspended for allocating plots in NOIDA for the construction of five star hotels in 2006, causing a loss of over Rs.4, 700 crore to the state exchequer.

The court fixed September 16 for a further hearing of the case and granted a fortnight's time to the state government to file a counter affidavit.

The petitioners have pleaded that keeping in view the 2010 Commonwealth Games, the state government had taken a policy decision empowering the development authorities to convert the commercial land into industrial land and allot the same for the hotel business.

They said the allotments were made after a collective decision of the NOIDA Board and thus they alone cannot be penalised. (ANI)