Strangely, more often than not, the Government is caught on wrong foot when making tall claims of benefits and returns from a reform that seems controversial from the very beginning. When the Roshni Act was introduced in 2007, the Government hastened to claim that this would earn the state a massive revenue to the tune of 25,000 crore rupees. The euphoric announcement added that this windfall would be invested in power generation scheme and that would alleviate the problem of power supply deficit. As time passed, both of these expectations seem to have been frustrated by ground realities. The Roshni scheme has drawn damp squib, something which the Revenue Minister accepted in all honesty.
It is one thing to understand the psychology of human beings and another thing to expect them to behave as you would like them to. A bare sum of 76 crore rupees has been realized as against 25,000 crore from the transfer of Government land to persons who have been in illegal possession of the same. The amount of Government land in illegal possession but approved for transfer of ownership rights is 17, 86,000 kanals. Revenue Department received 2, 56,792 applications for vesting possession rights. Ownership rights have been conferred in respect of 6, 04,662 kanals. This should have generated revenue to the tune of 316 crore of rupees but in actuality only 76 crore of rupees could be realized. Many among those to whom ownership was transferred have declined to make the payment as stipulated in the Roshni Act. The fact of the matter is that there are many flaws in the Act and the defaulters have taken shelter behind these flaws. The Government should have studied the clauses of the Act in minute detail and sought legal opinion so that the snags could be repaired and provisions amended. Nearly seven years have passed by since the passing of the Act and the Government is yet to begin revising the Act and bringing about revision in clauses that are not clear or that give the benefit of doubt to the persons in whom right of ownership is vested.
The situation has become ludicrous. Why the Government has not been pursing rectification of flawed provision of the Act is a mystery. But more baffling is the question that the Government has taken no step for eviction of illegal possesses of the Government land once the time for application for regularization of land has elapsed. There are two categories of illegal possessors of Government land who stand to be evicted. One is of those who did not make application for regularization and the other is of those who applied but did not deposit the stipulated amount within time. Both of them have to be evicted in accordance with the Roshni Act but the Government has not taken any step towards their eviction.
Revenue authorities themselves are confused about various aspects of the Act. For example there is confusion about the girdawari extract (intikhab girdawari). The Act says that only that land will be considered for regularization whose girdawari has been done. Girdawari is an important revenue procedure of reconfirming the details of a particular patch of land, its contours, productivity, possession etc. Responsible revenue staff is put in charge of this most important revenue record on which the entire agrarian and taxation system depends. Girdawari is conducted by revenue officials twice a year regularly, once for summer crop called rabi and once for autumn crop called kharif. This is the most authentic record of possession of land. But Government banned girdawari for several years prior to the promulgation of Roshni Act. As such, the exact status of the Government land earmarked for ownership rights under Roshni Act remained unclear and ambiguous. This has given rise to litigation. The Government has not been able to find a solution to this problem nor did it consider such an exigency at the time of making the enactment. Thus the Roshni Act turned into a mess and did not move forward. According to a statement of the Revenue Minister, the Government is reported to have approached the Law Department for making necessary amendment in Roshni Act so that the hurdles that have appeared are overcome.
Looking in retrospect one feels that the Roshni Act was passed in a haste and full attention was not mounted on its niceties and allied issues. Meaningless euphoria was exuded on the benefits of the Act to the state exchequer and the Government was misled. Lastly not rectifying the fault, whether in the Act or in the implementation part, remains a question which the State Revenue Department shall have to answer.
Trending Now
E-Paper
Follow our WhatsApp channel