Land grabbers abundant in UP

October 11, 2008	(Be the first to rate this story!)  Loading ...
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Land-grabbing has is a profitable business in Uttar Pradesh. One of the main reasons attributed to this is the inaction against land-grabbers, who are mainly resourceful mafia elements and hardened criminals with political connections. This speaks poor about the police and the revenue department and comes contrary to the government’s repeated claims about the improvement in the law and order situation. A recently held survey by the government, reveals that around 11,000 hectares of government land are in illegal possession. This is estimated to be the twice the size of the residential area developed by the NOIDA on the outskirts of New Delhi. Going by the prevailing market price of real estate, the cost of the said land is estimated to be well above Rs 6,000 crore. This, according to government’s own admission is enough to sustain its ambitious scheme to provide two-room houses to over 2 lakh beneficiaries belonging to the below poverty line category in urban areas of the state during the current financial year. The scheme has been launched for the first time this year in memory of BSP’s founder, Kanshiram. However, the land under illegal possession is estimated to be much more than that identified at present. This is a just a tip of the iceberg, as vast land belonging to nazul, forest and gram samaj are said to be encroached upon by the land-grabbers.

While the problem persists everywhere, it is more widespread in certain districts like Ghaziabad, Gautambudhnagar, Lucknow, Mathura, Agra, Meerut, Mainpuri, Moradabad, Gorakhpur, Saharanpur, Kannauj and Bulandshahr, Sultanpur, and Firozabad. The result of this is that there is an acute pressure on the government’s land bank needed for different development purposes. For instance, there is hardly any land left with many gram sabhas for the construction of primary schools and even gram panchayat bhawans.

In its review meeting held recently, the problem has been viewed with concern by the revenue board, which has emphasised the need for taking urgent measures to check illegal possession of government land. A roadmap prepared for this purpose, envisages inviting complaints about land-grabbing from different districts either in writing or on telephone. The complainant is given the option to either hide or disclose his identity. The complaint is noted and processed though asking for a report on it from the district magistrates of the districts concerned. Member (judicial) of the revenue board, Sanjay Bhoosreddy said that as many as 1, 00,465 complaints had been received from almost all the districts of UP. All these complaints were being pursued actively under the direct supervision of the revenue board to DMs of the districts concerned. The result, he said, was remarkable. In the process, 7454.3553 hectares of land had been recovered from illegal possession, Bhoosreddy pointed out. Many more such complaints were still under process, he added.

News Published Under:   Real Estate India |

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