Hyderabad: Fake and fabricated documents including those giving general power of attorney have led to encroachment of evacuee property in the IT corridor, where land goes for up to Rs 15 crore an acre.
The IT corridor has about 1,000 acre of evacuee land — that was left behind by those who migrated to Pakistan after India’s Independence and Police Action — of which the state government recovered 250 acre last year, after a long struggle in the High Court.
Most of the remaining 800 acres have been encroached. Principal secretary, revenue, B.R. Meena on May 2 issued orders to recover about 750 acres which were occupied using fabricated documents and fake GPAs. There has been no action so far. Even a survey was not conducted.
Illegal mutation of evacuee land parcels in Puppalaguda and Manikonda began after the IT boom in 2002 and the Chief Commissioner of Land Affairs has received complaints from locals and RTI activists regarding this.
RTI activist P. Suresh said a builder had recently begun construction of villas in 94.3 acres of evacuee land based on approvals given by the HMDA. “When we asked HMDA how it gave permission for the construction of buildings and villas, it provided us a copy (No. 6067) issued by the Rajendranagar tahsildar. When we sought details of the document, the tahsildar replied that the file had gone missing,” he said.
After the High Court restored 250 acres of evacuee land in Puppalaguda and Banjara Hills, the Ranga Reddy revenue department is still seeking ‘Basic Property Register’ to identify evacuee land in and around the city.
According to records, nearly 20 families left for Pakistan during partition, without transferring ownership of their land to anyone. Such evacuee land parcels are are located at Rajendranagar, Serilingampally, Balanagar, Asifnagar, Bahadurpura, Khairatabad and Shaikpet mandals in Ranga Reddy and Hyderabad districts.
The government from 1948 to 1956 prepared a list of the land parcels and notified the properties as evacuee land. The then government had prepared a ‘Basic Property Register’ and handed over it to the office of the Regional Settlement Commission (under the ministry of rehabilitation) at Mumbai in the 1950s. Now, officials are seeking the register to consider it as official evidence.
