Officials in dock over land grab

Hyderabad: After recovering valuable government land from encroachers, officials are now going after the officials who colluded with land sharks. Secunderabad revenue divisional officials who recovered land worth more than Rs 1,000 crore after a year-long exercise found that several revenue officials had assisted encroachers.

Officials found ex-tahsildar Rama Krishnaiah from Trimulgherry mandal guilty of facilitating encroachments of land worth Rs 800 crore. Officials investigated the encroachments on the directions of Chief Secretary Rajiv Sharma and submitted a report to the government based on which the CCLA chief commissioner suspended the ex-tahsildar.

Secunderabad revenue divisional officials found that several staffers including the revenue inspector to the tahsildhar and a few persons working in the revenue minister’s office had colluded with land grabbers in Shaikpet and Marredpally mandals. Following complaints received by locals and panchayat ward members, apart from those received by the Chief Minister’s Office against land encroachments in Ranga Reddy district, the collector appointed an inquiry team from the Panchayat Raj and revenue departments last year.

Going by the reports submitted by the inquiry tams, the collector has issued showcause notices to sarpanches and panchayat secretaries working with gram panchayats in the IT corridor. Secunderabad RDO U. Raghuram Sharma told this newspaper that these officials were found to have misused their powers.

“A tahsildar who was suspended earlier was misguiding both the revenue department and the Secunderabad Cantonment Board by providing false information on a parcel of government land. Several incidents have come to light when we verified cases relating to land disputes. We have recommended action against the erring staff,” Mr Sharma said.