As the Indian Navy submitted its report on the Adarsh Housing Society scam today, the Defence Ministry indicated it would come down heavily on the culprits, who hoodwinked the system, by Monday, saying the action it recommends would be so "comprehensive" as to serve as a "preventive" step against future recurrences.

"The Navy has submitted its report on the Adarsh Society issue. We are studying the reports submitted by Army, Defence Estates and the Navy to collate all relevant information. The punitive action will come on Monday and it will be so comprehensive that it would prevent such scams from occurring in the future," Defence Ministry sources said here.

The Navy, sources said, had raised serious security concerns over the 31-storey building in a military zone, thereby compromising the several sensitive installations including a naval air base nearby.

Its report also noted that the building had come up with the security perimeter of its installations and it could be a high risk to its installations, as it was possible to monitor the activities of the naval base easily from it.

In fact, the security concerns were shared by the Army too in its report submitted last week to the Defence Ministry, sources said, pointing out that it wanted the ministry to get to the bottom of the issue of how the land was alienated by officers posted locally in 1999.

The Army was in "de facto" possession of the 6,490-sqmt plot of land since the early 1990s and had used it as a training location for its troops in the metropolis.

With these strong recommendations from the Army and the Navy, the Defence Ministry is likely to take a concrete view on the action it wanted to be taken against the personnel responsible for the housing society coming up there and against the promoters of the 100-metre high complex.

Already, the ministry is mulling action against its personnel and society promoters, including recommending probes by CBI and Income Tax, apart from complete take over of the building or demolishing it citing security and environment concerns, after it was stung by the Adarsh Housing Society episode recently.

However, sources said the ministry had not yet approached the CBI to probe the case.

An informal expert group of ministry officials would meet over the weekend to take a final call on the punitive action in the case and to collate all information from the three reports from the Army, Navy and Defence Estates directorate.

An initial probe ordered by Defence Minister A K Antony into the scam had concluded that there "prima facie" was "a criminal conspiracy" by defence personnel, who had "colluded" with the promoters of the housing society.

The Army had in its report admitted that its officers in Mumbai had issued a No-Objection Certificate (NOC) to the society to construct the housing complex in 1999.

The Navy, though, was not even approached by the promoters for an NOC.

The Army said its headquarters here was kept in the dark by local officers on the transfer of the land, which was in its possession for over 60 years, to the housing society.

In the 104-apartment building, that had provision for flats for Kargil widows and martyrs' families, Army, Navy and Defence Estate personnel, both serving and retired, apart from politicians and their relatives were allotted 40 flats.

Former Army Chiefs Gen Deepak Kapoor and Gen N C Vij, former Navy Chief Admiral Madhavendra Singh, former Union Minister Suresh Prabhu and relatives of Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan were among the allottees.

Some of the allottees from the services and defence estates were also part of the chain of command that had "colluded" with Adarsh Society promoters to transfer the land from the Army's possession and to obtain an NOC.

The Army has already indicated that it was all set to institute a court of inquiry into the episode to fix the role of its serving officers.