675230 Kanals Of State Land Up For Grabs @ Rs 4487/Kanal
Srinagar, June 25: A government initiative which was meant to boost the financial resources of Jammu and Kashmir seems to be going horribly wrong. Conceived to fetch the equity for shaping fortunes of the state and transforming it into power exporting region, the much-hyped Roshni scheme is only growing murkier.
In 2001 the government had enacted - The Jammu and Kashmir State Lands (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act - also named Roshni Act to generate “Rs 25,000 crore by vesting ownership rights over state land also called Nazool land.” The idea was to sell the state land at market rates to the people who had illegally encroached upon it. But 10-years on the scheme, which was re-visited by Ghulam Nabi Azad-led coalition government in 2007 is turning out to be the “biggest scandal in the state’s history”, as a senior Revenue Official puts it.Not only has JK lost its prized land through Roshni Act, the expected returns have drastically now come down to a meagre Rs 6000 crore. There is now widespread apprehension in the revenue administration that even the target of Rs 6000 won’t be met, despite thousands of kanals of land already getting consumed under the “infamous” Act.During this year’s budget session of the legislature, the government revealed that it has approved ownership rights over 6, 75, 230 kanals of land in the state under various categories at an approved cost of Rs 303 crore. However the returns have been just Rs 72 crore so far. While 32, 238 kanals of land in 10 districts of Kashmir (excluding Ladakh division) have raised Rs 52.20 crore against approved cost of Rs 114.53 crore, the situation is dismal in Jammu region where government has got just Rs 20.70 crore against 6,42,992 kanals of land against the approved cost of Rs 189.46 crore.The government maintains that 20, 25,083 kanals of state land is under occupation in Jammu and Kashmir - 16, 02,148 kanals in Jammu region and 4, 22,935 kanals in Kashmir valley. So far it has received over 2.60 lakh applications for proprietary rights over 17, 57,581 kanals of encroached state land.Of the total land on which the ownership rights have been vested so far, at an average the per kanal cost of land in Jammu district works out to be Rs 40587, in Kathua Rs 1038, in Kishtwar Rs 217, in Doda Rs 175, in Poonch Rs 11, in Rajouri Rs 74, in Ramban Rs 139, in Reasi Rs 300, in Samba Rs 7191 and in Udhampur Rs 299.In Kashmir division the per kanal cost of land has been fixed at an average of Rs 2070528 in district Srinagar, Rs 1254 in district Anantnag, Rs 1654 in Bandipora, Rs 1142 in Baramulla, Rs 3458 in Budgam, Rs 100 in Ganderbal, Rs 1478 in Kulgam, Rs 1060 in Kupwara, Rs 27429 in Pulwama and Rs 5300 in Shopian.What went wrong with the Act which was termed as “revolutionary step” by the successive governments? Though the legislation was passed in 2001, it only came into force in 2004.For conferring ownership rights of the state land, the government in 2007 framed new rules - The Jammu and Kashmir State Lands (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Rules, 2007, issued under Revenue Department Notification SRO 64 dated 5 May, 2007.A high level “rate fixing committee” headed by the two Divisional Commissioners was authorized to approve cases for ownership rights in Jammu and Srinagar districts while as the committees for the other districts including the areas falling under the Tourism Development Authority was headed by the concerned Deputy Commissioners.As per the rules the “authorized occupants” owning residential structures on state or Nazool land upto 2 kanals were required to pay only 25 percent of the value of the land determined by the committee and 40 percent upto 10 kanals. For authorized overstayed and unauthorized occupants, the rates were fixed at 35 percent and 50 percent of the value of the land.In commercial category, authorized, authorized overstayed and unauthorized occupants had to pay 30 percent, 45 percent and 60 percent of the value of the land respectively.In case of institutions- education/ religious/charitable/social institutions/ trusts/societies and political parties the rates were fixed at 15 percent and 25 percent of the market value of the land.The scheme provided for rewards and penalties- a rebate of highest 25 percent for payments within three months and a highest penalty of 35 percent for payments in 2 years.But the blow to the Roshni scheme was dealt in February 2007 when the then government reintroduced the scheme in legislature fixing a token amount of Rs 100 for upto 100 kanals of agriculture land.Though the government tried to justify the move saying 19 lakh cultivators would get benefited, it was least knowing that the state has less than 16 lakh cultivators and only 16.27 percent of them had encroached upon state land.The then Leader of Opposition, and present Finance Minister Abdul Rahim Rather, had openly come out against the amendments brought by Azad government in the Act.“Here you are giving property rights to land-grabbers who have occupied Nazool land in cities and khalisa land in villages,” he had said. “Only rich, elite and land-grabbers had the audacity to grab the state land and now we have a benevolent government who gave them its rights,” Rather had said, cautioning the state wouldn’t get any money out of the amendments.As frauds under Roshni started coming to fore, a case filed by Vigilance Organization for transfer of state land under Roshni Act in Gulmarg is a classic example of how the Act was allowed to be misused. The VO filed cases against top officials of the Government for transferring state land under Roshni Act to some business tycoons in Gulmarg.A government handout released on February 22 this year said Rs 1,53,205 was raised against 3,113 kanals of land allotted among land owners under Roshni Act in district Kupwara.The Roshni issue had rocked the budget session at Jammu in March this year too. Cutting across party lines members alleged that government land is being sold for peanuts under the “dubious” scheme.The fears are proving right. An administrative head of a district told Greater Kashmir that the land sold under Roshni on meager price has to be bought back by the government from the occupants at whopping cost for various development projects, which in turn is hitting the infrastructure development in the state.
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