From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore
Bangalore, Aug 30: Finally, the BJP Government headed by Karnataka Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar has decided to take action for recovering thousands of acres of prime Government lands in and around the city encroached by land mafia and other influential people worth several thousands of crores of Rupees.
The State Government’s decision to recover the encroached Government lands is taken on the basis of the comprehensive reports of the Joint Legsilature panel headed by former JD(S) MLA A T Ramaswamy, which was constituted by the JD(S)-BJP coalition regime headed by the then chief minister H D Kumaraswamy way back in 2006.
The Ramaswamy panel, which did an exhaustive study of the entire issue of encroachments of government lands in and around the city, had submitted two volumes of reports, the first one or the interim report, was submitted in 2007, exactly five years ago.
However, the Kumaraswamy regime collapsed over the transfer of power issue before taking any action on the report. After a brief spell of the President’s Rule in the State, the BJP came to power on its own in the 2008 assembly polls with B S Yeddyurappa as the chief minister.
But neither Yedddyurappa nor his successor D V Sadananda Gowda, who could not complete even one year in office, could not implement the Ramaswamy panel report.
The Ramaswamy panel, it may be recalled, had mentioned that over 41,300 acres of prime land had been encroached by 45,000 people, who included land sharks and other influential people, including sizeable number of ordinary and middle class citizens. The land included property belonging to the government, civic and local bodies and other state undertakings. Of this, over 8,300 acres of prime property had been encroached in the Bangalore city district alone and these people had resorted to huge monetary transactions by creating fake records with the connivance of officials.
The land encroachers included as many as 108 cooperative housing societies, which had formed illegal layouts and distributed sites to gullible people on the strength of bogus records.
Considering the huge land value in the city and suburbs, the value of the entire encroached Government property is estimated to be worth several thousands of the crores of rupees.
And now, five years after the Ramaswamy panel submitted its interim report in the year 2007, the Deputy Chief Minister K S Eshwarappa, who is also holding the Revenue portfolio, on Thursday held a meeting with department officials and other public agencies concerned to chalk out a strategy to recover encroached government lands in the city.
Briefing reporters after the meeting, Eshwarappa said the Government has decided to breathe life into the Legislature Committee Report by taking concrete measures to recover encroached lands in the city.
The department has been studying all issues to clear encroachment of government lands, he said.
As a first step in the direction of recovering encroached gov ernment lands, Eshwarappa said the process of recovering 2,300 acres of land valued at Rs 5,000 crore in Jala Hobli in Devanahalli taluk of Bangalore North will commence in the next 15 days.
Certain issues concerning recovery of encroached land would be placed before the State Cabinet for discussion and decision, Eshwarappa indicated.
The Deputy Chief Minister said the Government was also considering regularizing some of the layouts with a view to protect the interests of large number of poorer sections and middle classes, who had obtained sites in such layouts.
However, he said the government’s move on regularization was hanging fire as the President of India has not yet given assent to the Karnataka Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Bill 2007.
The State Legislature passed the Bill to prohibit people operating individually and in groups in grabbing lands belonging to the State Government, local authorities, religious or charitable institutions either by force or by deceit.