Land settlement involves a number of activities like identification of land, establishing boundaries, recording its status and ownership, alienation and mutation records, productivity and many other things. But most essential of these are establishing ownership and possession of the land and recording the dimensions and boundaries. Most of the land disputes are about ownership. The historical and basic land settlement in the State was conducted by a British Revenue Officer named Mr. Lawrence in around 1891 on the invitation of the then Maharaja of J&K. It is generally called Lawrence’s Land Settlement and until now is considered the most authentic and dependable record.
But about 125 years have passed when that settlement was done. During this one and a quarter century, many great changes took place in the State with extensive impact on the land and the record maintained so far. A variety of issues surfaced as new dispensation came into force. Two major land reform Acts were passed onwards of the extinction of monarchy, establishment of popular rule and accession of the State to the Indian Union. Sale purchase of land took place on a large scale as the purchasing capability increased and owing to population explosion, residential land assumed out of proportion importance. The work of the Revenue Department increased manifold and it had to recruit a number of Patwaris, Girdawars, Naib Tehsildars and Tehsildars who form the base of the edifice of revenue authority. The Government needed more and more land for carrying forward development projects and programmes and in view of this the Land Acquisition Act came into force, which made it mandatory for the land owners to let the Government acquire their land if it was meant for developmental purpose. The component of acquiring land for defence purposes also contributed to more work for revenue officials because most of the land now under the possession of army has been lent on long lease which is a part of the function of the Revenue Department.
In view of ever burgeoning work at the Revenue Department, the Government felt it necessary to initiate programme for land resettlement so that most of the land disputes could be ended. This would also reduce the pendency of law suits in the courts of law. The Government, therefore, recruited large number of Technical Revenue staff on the presumption that they have the expertise of handling revenue cases and their dimensions. Moreover, seven posts of Regional Directors of Land Records and Surveys were also created in 2013 to expedite the task of completing revenue settlement in the State. But this purpose stands defeated owing to the shifting of the entire recruited staff to the newly created administrative units. Strangely, instead of making new recruitments for these administrative units, the Land Settlement organ has been left to starvation. Very amusingly, the shifted staff continues to be paid by the Revenue Department and they work for various administrative units. The number of these technical hands in Jammu region is 85 and in Kashmir around 150
This is not correct administrative measure and is likely to create many difficulties. The foremost disadvantage is that the task of land settlement has passed into a state of limbo and the expectation that land disputes would get resolved to a large extent cannot be realized… The work at the land settlement has come to a grinding halt. Secondly, it is reported that land disputes ultimately lead to crime and mafia and as such become the source of social aberrations. Delaying or deferring land settlement has already done much harm to mega projects like Jammu-Srinagar rail link. The main reason for inordinate delay in this and other big projects pertained to the difficulty of land acquisition. First there appeared the dispute about the possession of the land that needed to be acquired and secondly exact dimensions of the land also posed problems. One more problem that has cropped up is that no replacement has been made once a Revenue office is transferred. The post of Regional Director, Land Records and Surveys for Rajouri-Poonch has been lying vacant since August last year. Similarly, settlement work has not been completed even in one village by the Regional Directors for Udhampur-Reasi districts and Chenab valley (districts of Ramban, Doda and Kishtwar). These transfers were in contravention of the policy approved when land settlement was taken up.
Keeping these hassles in mind, we strongly suggest the Government sends back the Land Settlement staff to the original assignment and make fresh recruitment of administrative staff for newly created administrative units. In doing so, the land settlement project will not be harmed in any way and the expertise will be used properly to deliver the goods
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