Chandigarh, Sep 20 (IANS): Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders in Punjab Saturday sought a time-bound enquiry into the actions of officials of the state's forest department for allegedly "misguiding" the state government and various courts on the Punjab Land Preservation Act.

BJP Member of Parliament Vijay Sampla and assistant media adviser to the Punjab government Vineet Joshi submitted a memorandum in this regard to Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal detailing facts about the issue.

Holding forest department officials responsible for "misguiding Government of Punjab and courts on Punjab Land Preservation Act-1900", Sampla and Joshi pointed out that third and fourth generation owners of around 1.5 lakh hectares of land are facing hardships.

They pointed out that the forest officials were wrongly re-notifying the same land under PLPA-1900 without following the due procedure laid down in the Act.

"The forest officials are not only misguiding the government by portraying PLPA-1900 lands as forest land, but they have even tried to misguide the courts by taking divergent stand on the issue of PLPA-1900," the leaders pointed out.

The BJP leaders submitted documents to the chief minister to point out that forest officials had filed affidavits for the same land in which it was stated that the land was forest land while in the second case the same land was notified as "not forest land".

Seeking a detailed probe against the forest officials, the BJP leaders also demanded strict punitive action against them.