*Noose all set to be tightened around encroachers
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Aug 23: After being reprimanded by the Division Bench of the State High Court, the administration has finally constituted multi-department committee to map entire land along the banks of River Tawi and identify the encroachers. With this step, noose is all set to be tightened around the encroachers as the highest court of the State has already passed directions for removal of encroachments without succumbing to pressure from any quarter.
The issue of unchecked encroachments on the banks of River Tawi came to be highlighted before the Division Bench of State High Court in three different Public Interest Litigations (PILs) titled Ashish Sharma and Another Versus State and Others; Dewakar Sharma and Others Versus State and Others and Inderjeet Khajuria Versus State and Others.
Numerous directions were passed by the highest court of Jammu and Kashmir to all the concerned authorities but the ground situation remained unchanged mainly because of non-serious approach towards the implementation of the orders. The intensity of casual approach can be gauged from the fact that all the concerned Government agencies even expressed inability to reveal the extent of encroachments along the banks of River Tawi, which otherwise has assumed alarming proportion.
Taking serious note of this, Division Bench of State High Court, in a PIL titled Dewakar Sharma and Others Versus State and Others, had on July 29, 2016 observed that confusion was prevailing as to which agency or department has to ensure that there is no encroachment and which department should have controlled and regulated the land along the banks of River Tawi right from Nagrota to Phallian Mandal.
With these observations, the Division Bench had passed several directions to the different wings of the administration for strict compliance that too in a time bound manner so as to remove the encroachments that have already taken place and to ensure that such attempts are not made in future by the encroachers, who according to the petitioners, have well knit network and even enjoy the patronage of influential people.
Now, after being reprimanded by the High Court, the Divisional Commissioner Jammu, Dr Pawan Kotwal vide Order No.601/RA/546-52 dated August 20, 2016 has constituted a multi-department committee to implement the directions of the High Court.
As per the order, the copy of which is available with EXCELSIOR, Deputy Commissioner Jammu is the convener of the committee while as Chief Engineer, Irrigation and Flood Control Department, Vice-Chairman Jammu Development Authority, Commissioner, Jammu Municipal Corporation, Regional Director, Survey and Land Records Jammu, Divisional Forest Officer, Jammu and Assistant Commissioner Nazool Jammu are the members of the committee.
As per the terms of reference, the committee has been directed to identify and map the entire land along the banks of River Tawi right from Nagrota to Phallian Mandal. After identifying and mapping the entire land, the committee will identify the encroachers and furnish their names to the High Court.
The committee has also been asked to identify the extent of encroachment, the nature of the encroachment or constructions raised by the encroachers and the time when the encroachment had taken place besides the steps taken for removing such encroachments till date. The committee will also prepare a record of satellite imagery of the entire area on a fortnightly basis which would be examined simultaneously by the concerned authorities to see as to whether there has been any fresh encroachment or not.
Stating that committee has been asked to submit its report within a period of 15 days, sources said that senior functionaries of different departments have been included in the committee so as to ensure that they play positive role in identifying the encroached land of their respective departments and then initiate steps for removal of the same. “In this way, JDA, JMC, Forest and Revenue Departments have been made accountable vis-à-vis checking encroachments along banks of River Tawi in future”, sources added.
Pointing towards the exercise initiated earlier for identification of encroachments along the banks of River Tawi but without any tangible results, sources said, “there cannot be any excuse about taking present exercise to logical conclusion as now all the concerned agencies of the Government are armed with the explicit order of the highest court of Jammu and Kashmir and removal of encroachments has all the legal support”.
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