Karnataka Public Lands Corporation seeks more power to recover land from encroachers

BENGALURU: The Karnataka Public Lands Corporation the custodian of the government land in Bengaluru urban district has sought more powers to chase big land encroachers.

The seven-year old corporation is tasked with the job of keeping a hawk's eye on the land recovered by the revenue authorities. It has now asked for statutory powers to complete the massive job of recovering 2,995 acres of land worth thousands of crores.

“ As of now, the corporation depends on the next level of hierarchy like deputy commissioners, assistant commissioners and tahsildars for clearing encroachments. I have written to the government seeking supervisory powers over them so that we can monitor and be sure that land is recovered in a time-bound manner," corporation's managing director Subodh Yadav said.

The corporation, whose mandate also involves “to keep the protected land from encroachment,“ has been neglected over the years. Of the 12 IAS officers posted as MDs, nine discharged their duties in a part-time capacity .“As a result, officers showed little interest in its functioning,“ a source pointed out.

Additional Commissioner (Commercial Taxes) the late D K Ravi had held the MD's post as an additional charge. In Yadav , the entity has got a full-time MD after a long time.

Presently , encroached plots are categorised as those below three acres, 3-5 acres, 5-10 acres and above 10 acres. “This approach is flawed, especially when we are dealing with encroachments in urban areas. So we want to have a valuation-based approach," Yadav said.

Former Additional Chief Secretary V Balasubramanian, who headed a state-appointed Task Force on Recovery of Public Lands, argued in favour of more powers to the public land corporation. “It is a government company without legal powers to relieve encroachments. The very first MD (V Manjula) was also revenue secretary , so she had some powers.Statutory authority to this body is important, especially now that it has a full-time MD," he said.

Principal Secretary (Revenue) Basavaraju said the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms would decide on delegating more powers to the corporation.

Of the 1.22 lakh acre of government land in Bengaluru urban area, 17,515 acres have been identified as clear encroachments.