Daijiworld Media Network – Udupi (HB)
Udupi, Apr 17: MLA Raghupati Bhat requested land surveyors to withdraw their strike and resume their duty at the earliest. “There are 55 land surveyors operating in the district. I spoke to revenue minister R Ashoka and he ensured that the pending money will be paid to the surveyors soon. There are 8,000 to 10,000 applications pending related to land surveys on different cases. I hope everything will be solved soon,” he said.
He was speaking in a press meet held at MLA office Udupi here on Saturday April 17, He said, “The two major demands of the land surveyors is making them permanent in service and fixing minimum wages. In other districts, surveyors did not get even minimum wages. Hence, the land surveyors held a strike for three months. But it disrupted many works like 11E survey, title deed, land conversion etc. A surveyor can do a minimum of 30 to 35 survey works. I hope that they will understand the circumstances of people and get back to work.”
Dushyantha, district president of Licensed Land Surveyors Association said, “We will call a meeting of land surveyors and will take a collective decision on Monday April 17. The government is recruiting 2,000 candidates and training them for survey works. They have decided to replace all experienced surveyors. But we will come to a decision by discussing with the members.”
The major demand of the surveyors is that the government should pay back the pending amount of licensed land surveyors who worked on Tatkal Podi measurement in 2013 and pending amount of Podi-free campaign work. Another issue is a decision was taken during 2013, that license should be renewed once in a three yeara, but this is not enforced by the government so far and minimum wages have not been fixed for the surveyors. One more demand is to allow them to log in again, which was blocked during a strike of three months.
Mattaru Ratnakar Hedge, president, Coastal Development Authority, Shashikumar, Ravikanth Bhat, Nagesh, and Shivakumar were present during the meeting.