Officers of the Revenue Department in Chikkamagaluru have reclaimed 35 acres of government land in Mudigere taluk, which had been granted to people violating the rules. Surprisingly, the bagair hukum committee granted land to people residing abroad, allegedly without following the set procedures.
The officials carried out procedures to reclaim the land at Hadioni village in Balur hobli of Mudigere taluk in the last two days.
The illegal grant of government land was revealed, during an inquiry by the Revenue Department officials into alleged grant of over 6,000 acres of government land violating the rules in the district.
During the preliminary inquiry, the officers found that around 35 acres of land had been allotted to seven people of an extended family. Of the seven, two are residents of Australia and one is residing in the U.S.A. Besides that, one person is in Mumbai, another in Mangaluru, and one more beneficiary who settled in Bengaluru died a year ago.
The taluk bagair hukum committee granted them land without verifying the necessary documents.
The Revenue Department has filed a case against two tahsildars and two other employees allegedly responsible for the land grant.
The Mudigere police have arrested two employees.
The officers learnt that a person, who owned a coffee estate at Hadioni, got his relatives granted land. Now, all the grants were cancelled. H.D. Rajesh, AC, cancelled the grant after verifying the documents.
The officers also found that the coffee planter had encroached upon another 45 acres of forest land. The authorities are also working to reclaim it.
Mr. Rajesh told The Hindu that he had already cancelled over 200 grants after verifying the documents.
“There is a set procedure to grant government land. The applicant should be the resident of the taluk and he should have cultivated the land continuously. However, none of these criteria have been observed while granting the land. We have taken the land back into our custody and placed our board,” he said.
The officer said that the officers have also marked the forest land encroached, he added.
