Radheshyam Jadhav, TNN, Nov 6, 2010
PUNE: When, in 2001, the Andra irrigation project was completed in Maval taluka, 14 villages were displaced. Yet nine years later, just three of the 1,300 families affected have been resettled. Similarly , some 60 per cent of families affected by the construction of Varasgaon dam in 1974 are still awaiting rehabilitation.
The hundreds of displaced and affected people already fighting to be rehabilitated in the state are now facing a new problem — the mysterious absence of land records.
The state information commissioner (Pune bench) has received a number of complaints in which project-affected people (PAPs) and farmers are denied information about their land by district collectorate officers who say they cannot provide information as 'land records were not found' . The PAPs and farmers fear the 'missing' documents indicate that their land has been grabbed and the records manipulated.
State information commissioner Vijay Kuvalekar has now directed the district collector to prepare a time-bound plan to organise the records in the department and submit a report to the commission.
The information commissioner's directive was in response to an RTI appeal by Mundhwa (Pune) resident Sunil Jagtap against the public information officer (PIO) and tehsildar in the district rehabilitation office, the appellate authority and the district rehabilitation officer.
Jagtap had sought information about land acquired and used for rehabilitation of the displaced people of the Varasgaon dam project in Pune district. However district collectorate officials , including the PIO and tehsildar in the district rehabilitation office, failed to provide him with information. Jagtap, who has been following the case since 2006, then approached the information commissioner.
The information commission found that district collectorate officers were giving similar replies in all the cases. The tehsildar in the district rehabilitation office, Deepa Bhosale, told the information commission during the hearing that the records of old projects like Varsasgaon were not up to date and the documents were "worn out and need to be organised" .
Jagtap expressed the fear that the land which was allotted for rehabilitation has been sold without the knowledge of the PAPs. The farmers and PAPs are now waiting for the district collectorate to fulfil its promise to update and streamline the records so that they can learn the status of their 'missing' land.
"It is fact that many records are not in place at the district collectorate, particularly records of land meant for rehabilitation of PAPs," said an officer of the district collectorate, requesting anonymity. The district collector has ordered that a check be made on the records at the taluka level , which are still relatively intact."
"We (the district collectorate) have prepared a draft to collect the information and streamline the land records," said district collector Chandrakant Dalvi in a recent letter to Kuvalekar. "( As per the draft) land acquisition officers, land record officers, project officers, executive engineers and tehsildars will co-ordinate and computerise the land records... Strict orders have been issued to officers to collect the land records and computerise the same."
DISPLACEMENT AND REHABILITATION
Andra is a medium irrigation project completed in 2001 and built on the Andra River near Mangrul in Maval taluka, which is a tributary of the Krishna. Fourteen villages were affected by this dam, out of which two were fully submerged. The project comes under the State Rehabilitation Act, 1976 and just three of the 1,300 families affected have been allotted land for land. t In 1974 the Varasgaon dam was constructed. Some families from those displace were rehabilitated with land in Daund (125 km from Pune), but about 60 per cent of families were left in the affected area without rehabilitation. t Of the 1,238 Pavana dam-affected landholders and 205 landless, ie 1,443 PAPs in all, eligible for 1 to 6 acres of cultivable land, only 340 acres of land had been allotted in 1968. Similarly 1,027 house plots have been allotted for the affected and 1,403 (1,238 + 205 landless) are still to be allotted. t Jadhavwadi, a project built on the river Sudha (a tributary of the Indrayani) began in 1985 and was completed in 2000. Jadhavwadi, Mendhewadi, Badalwadi, Jambhavadi and Shire are the five villages submerged/affected in this project. The Government of Maharashtra's Rehabilitation Act is applicable to this project, but not implemented. Among 112 khatedars (land owners) in these 5 villages, only 1 has got land. 111 are yet to get land.
(Source: Report of Peoples' Commission of Inquiry)
Land records to go online
On a recent visit to Pune, state chief secretary J P Dange had announced that the state government would make land record documents available online in six districts, including Pune, by March 2011. Computerisation is indeed underway under the National Land Records Modernisation Programme. Revenue offices will be connected to citizens' facilitation centres and anyone can seek land records from these centres. Pune, Nashik, Latur, Buldhana, Nagpur and Sindhudurg districts have been selected to go online in the first phase.
.JPG)
.JPG)
