India—A taciturn man in a black SUV started buying up tracts of arid agricultural land around this small town in the western Indian state of Rajasthan in 2009. He would sit in the parking lot outside the one-story concrete building that houses the land office and dole out cash for sellers from the back seat, according to real-estate brokers and a local government land official. The buyer represented by the man in the SUV, according to state land records, was Robert Vadra, a member of India’s powerful Nehru-Gandhi political clan, whose Congress party leads the country today and has for much of its more-than-66-year post-colonial history.
Soon after he began buying, the federal government announced plans to promote large-scale solar-energy production, a land-intensive project for which the area was well-suited. He continued buying land, and in 2011 the state, too, announced solar incentives. The value of the land Mr. Vadra bought soared sixfold within three years, a state record of land transactions shows.
State officials say they are investigating whether there were any legal violations, such as exceeding land-purchase limits, in the investments by Mr. Vadra, who is the son-in-law of Congress party President Sonia Gandhi and brother-in-law of Rahul Gandhi, the leader of Congress’s campaign in elections now under way.
A spokesman for Mr. Vadra said he is a private citizen who has been subjected to a campaign to malign him for political reasons. “He has acquired and disposed of real estate in exercise of his rights and has obtained no favor or benefit from anyone,” the spokesman said. “He has complied with all applicable provisions of law and has nothing further to say.”
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