J&K to include entire govt land in negative list to stop encroachment

Entire state land of J&K will be included in the ‘negative list’ to prevent registration and therefore, encroachment upon government land.

Srinagar | Updated: 12 March, 2023 8:18 pm IST
manoj sinha
J&K LG Manoj Sinha has vowed to free government land of encroachment.

In a bid to stop encroachment on the government land, the administration of LG Manoj Sinha has initiated a massive exercise to mark entire state land in the “negative list”.

The list will be made available to all registrars and sub-registrars, who will ensure that no registry of the government land occurs.

“Following completion of the process, entire state land will be marked in ‘negative list’ and this list will be uploaded in software and supplied to all registrars and sub registrars who will ensure that the state land isn’t registered,” official sources told a local news agency.

“New software will be developed in Pune,” sources said, adding the government hopes to complete the exercise soon.

The revenue department, which has taken the task of developing software marking the state land in the “negative list”, will, however, be open to objections.

“If someone has a grievance that his private land has been shown as the state land inadvertently, he will be heard. If the person succeeds in authenticating his claim based on documents, the land will be removed from the negative list,” sources said.

The step will prevent further encroachment of the government land in a fool-proof manner, they said, adding there have been reports that anti-encroachment drive by the administration notwithstanding, some land grabbers in connivance with lower staff of the revenue department continued to make attempts to encroach upon the state land.

“The new technique will thwart their designs,” they said.

Admitting that since it was not physically possible to keep eye on the state land to prevent encroachment, sources said that encroachments will automatically end once registration of the state land is stopped.

The new system is expected to take a few days as the revenue department, which has been executing the task, will have to identify the land and record its entries into the software. Further, they will also have to ensure that wrong entries are not made and private land is not shown as state land which can cause inconvenience to the local population.

However, as per the sources, an option will be kept open to entertain people’s complaints if they feel that their private land has wrongly been included as state land.

According to sources, a direction has gone to the staff to ensure that wrong entries are avoided and only state land is shown in the negative list.

“Sale deeds of the people will now directly go into their accounts and could be downloaded online,” sources said, adding entire registration process of a piece of land will be completed in a single day.

It is pertinent to mention that the government had launched a massive anti-encroachment drive in Jammu and Kashmir in January and recovered huge state land encroached upon by the influential people. The drive was halted temporarily after protests by common people over alleged mismanagement of the eviction process.

Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha recently announced that the anti-encroachment drive will continue without affecting the poor but against the influential people who have encroached upon the government land for their next four generations. Such people will not be spared, he declared.

While going ahead with the anti-encroachment drive, sources pointed out that the need was felt for developing a fool-proof mechanism to ensure that such a drive was not required in future and also ensure that no further encroachment takes place.

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