Make all Revenue Department services online; take land mafia head on: CM Naidu

Amaravati: Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu has asked the Revenue Department to submit a detailed report about the irregularities in land transactions in the last five years.

During a review meeting of the Revenue Department, officers briefed the Chief Miniter about the large-scale irregularities in land transactions in the past five years.

Chandrababu directed the officials to submit a detailed report on the officers' involvement in illegal transactions. He asked them to identify the persons responsible for such irregularities and binaries, if any. He also told them to identify the political leaders involved in fraud.

The officers explained to the Chief Minister about the departmental action being taken on illegal land encroachments, and fake transactions that have taken place in the past five years.

The Chief Minister also directed the officials that there is a large extent of land in the state that the previous government threatened to bring under Section 22A and these issues must be resolved. Chandrababu also directed take land mafia head-on by enforcing effectively the provisions of the Preventive Detention Act and the Anti-Land Grabbing Act.

Regretting that some persons have lost their most valuable lands due to the changing of revenue records by the staff members who resorted to corruption, the Chief Minister made it clear that this practice should end immediately or stringent action will be taken if anyone resorts to such illicit practice. The Chief Minister felt an immediate need to cleanse the entire Revenue Department to save the lands of the people from encroachments.

Chandrababu Naidu also ordered to make all revenue services online for the benefit of the general public.

Chandrababu said that online services should be made available for documents like birth certificates, death certificates, caste certificates, and income certificates. The Chief Minister mainly focussed on the appeals and complaints received from the public and the solutions of the Revenue Department.

Of the 1,74,720 appeals received from the public, 67,928 belong to the Revenue wing. These are mostly related to revenue records, land encroachments, and assigned lands, the officers informed the Chief Minister.

Chandrababu directed the officers to take immediate measures to resolve all such issues and find permanent solutions to them. He also made it clear that forcing the complainants to make rounds to the government offices to find solutions to their problems would not be tolerated any longer.

"If a complaint is received it should be solved permanently. Just resolving it for the heck of it will not be tolerated," Chandrababu said.

He said people are facing umpteen problems, particularly in the Revenue Department, due to the policies adopted by the previous government. Chief Minister said people are making rounds to the government offices to find solutions to their issues.

The Chief Minister felt an urgent need to cleanse the Revenue wing so that the people could get the services more easily. He said that a third-party audit should be conducted on all the exercises like how much time is being taken to resolve a particular problem and whether the complainant is satisfied or not with the solution.

The officers said of the 16,816 total number of villages, resurvey has been completed in 6,698 villages involving 85 lakh acres of land. The Chief Minister said that in this resurvey, 2,79,148 complaints have been received and these complaints should be resolved amicably. He directed to resurvey in other villages in a most transparent way.

Minister for Revenue Anagani Satya Prasad said that the photos of the former chief minister on the field marks are being removed and it costs Rs 15 for deleting each photo. He said Rs 12 crore is required to remove the photos from all the field marks in the state.