Madras High court wants government to have a re-look into task force operation
Chennai: Pointing out there is no prevention of encroachments on government lands in the last 15 years since the State government set up the Centralized Task Force (CTF) in 2001, the Madras high court has directed the state government to have a re-look into the issue of CTF and its operation, otherwise there will be direct intervention by courts to protect government lands.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice R.Mahadevan was passing interim orders on a petition from V.B.R.Menon of K.K.Nagar, which sought a direction to authorities to constitute a permanent Special Task Force with adequate powers and responsibilities to conduct periodic inspections, field surveys and removal of encroachments from all categories of vacant government lands in the districts of Kancheepuram and Tiruvallur and to take appropriate action to ensure proper utilisation of each property, including disposal of excess lands within a prescribed time limit.
The Bench said, “We are of the view that the petitioner is right in contending that the solution to have a proper record is only through the process of GPS.
Surprisingly, only one GPS is stated to have been obtained by the State government.” It would be penny wise and pound foolish not to acquire requisite GPS to see that government is able to protect its lands.
“We are informed by the petitioner that in fact, there are no expenses involved by the State government as there is a centralised funding for GPS to the extent of 100 per cent”.
The petitioner submitted that all that was required was one GPS per district and thus only 32 GPS would be required, the market costs of which ranges from '10 lakh up to whatever be the price at which ELCOT will procure it.
“We are thus, talking in terms of a budget of Rs 3 to Rs 4 crore, that also fully centralised funds to obtain GPS and to ensure that the correct picture is with the State government.
We do believe that this aspect can brook no further delay. The centralised task force set up by the state government as per the government order dated March 7, 2001 has obviously not achieved its objective,” the Bench said.
