KHAMMAM: Distressed farmers who are yet to receive pattas of their lands, are now going to the collectorates and tahsildar offices with pesticide bottles.
The falsehoods written by village revenue officers in the land records have become a headache for the collectors and tahsildars, who have to now deal with aggrieved farmers coming to their offices and threatening to consume the pesticide if the land pattas are not made in their favour.
Eluri Laxmiaah, a native of Erragadda under Tirumalayapalem mandal had 18 guntas land in the village. But the land was not listed in the land records and therefore he was denied a pattadar pass book.
Mr Laxmaiah said, “I was asked to give money by the VRO to list my land in the records.” Laxmaiah rushed to the collectorate along with a pesticide bottle. The police blocked his attempt and sent him home after counselling.
The reputation of the revenue department is being tarnished with the attitude of VROs and revenue inspectors and to some extent the tahsildars too. It may be recalled that Bhadradri collector Rajat Kumar Shaini openly criticised one of the tahsildars in his presence and had said, “The tahsildars keep any issue pending just so that they can get kickbacks.”
In Kesavapuram under Kusumanchi mandal, the revenue officials issued pattas to two farmers for one land. With this, one of the farmers, a woman, attempted to end her life along with her two daughters.
In another case, another farmer Sunkari Suresh, a native of Narasimharaopet came to the Tallada tahsildar office, holding a pesticide bottle. He said that a person in the village was trying to encroach his land by bribing the officials.
Koteswara Rao, a farmer from Chegomma under Kusumanchi mandal, who made several attempts to list his one acre land, so that a patta passbook could be issued, died due to a cardiac arrest.
Meanwhile, there are allegations that the VROs have fixed prices for every transaction—Rs 2,000 per acre for updating the land details online and Rs 10,000 for mutation.
Surprisingly, there has been no change in the attitude of revenue officials even though half a dozen VROs and surveyors were caught by ACB officials in the last eight months.
