Hyderabad: The Siddipet district revenue authorities are allegedly misleading the Telangana high court in a high-profile case of encroachment of assignment land as also government land in Sy No 356 of Pregnapur village in Gajwel mandal by a family of rich local landlords.
Recently, hearing a case filed against these landlords, the HC directed the collectors of all the districts in Telangana to survey and geotag all the government lands to prevent encroachments and submit compliance reports to the court.
The case took an interesting turn with the petitioners again approaching the court with a complaint against the revenue authorities, stating that they have never taken possession of the land as claimed in their affidavit.
Backed with evidence, the petitioners informed the court that even today the surplus land had been under the physical possession of the encroachers and the revenue department was not taking steps to resume the land and restore its ownership to the landless poor.
Inquiries revealed that Chittapuram Raju, a resident of Pregnapur, filed a PIL in the HC complaining against local landlord Vijay Kumar and his daughter, who he said were in possession of 37 acres of land in Sy no 356, which was declared surplus land under the Agriculture Ceiling Act and later distributed this to the landless poor.
“The original landlords who declared surplus land retained their ownership and possession over the same land till date. Though the government allotted this land to the landless poor, the revenue records like pahani still showed the names of the original declarants,” said the petitioner.
The tahasildar, in a report submitted to the then Medak collector, a copy of which is available with this newspaper, also categorically stated that Ac 37.09 was declared as ceiling surplus by M Laxmi Kantha Rao, M Vijay Kumar, M Veda Kumar and M Bhoopati Rao, and the same was assigned to 43 landless poor.
The report listed various sale transactions carried out by the original landowners even after the land was assigned to the landless poor. It also recommended to the collector to allow rectification of the records and protection of the government land.
“We are also urging the court to issue necessary directions to evict the encroacher and hand over the possession to landless poor,” the petitioner said.
