Excelsior Correspondent
KATHUA, Feb 8: Nearly fifty kanals of R&B Department and State land has been encroached upon by some locals of the area in connivance with the field Revenue staff at newly created Dinga Amb tehsil.
The village Sarpanch Kuldeep Gupta alleged that after Dinga Amb was accorded tensil status, the process of illegal encroachment on the State land was expedited. But the local Revenue authorities remained inactive. He alleged that as per record, 26 kanals of land belongs to R&B Department (Sub Div office) but hardly ten kanal area has remained with the R&B Sub Division authorities at Dinga Amb while nearly 16 kanal area has been grabbed by some locals.
The Sarpanch said that recently some State land had been identified by the Revenue team from Kathua and Hiranagar for the purpose of construction of Government offices at newly created tehsil headquarters here but after this process, some locals started encroachment on the State land. Nearly 15 kanal area behind the Tehsil office and about 20 kanal just in front of this Revenue office has been encroached upon by some people. The local Naib Tehsildar and even newly appointed Tehsildar were apprised of the matter by the Panchayat members but no action was witnessed in this regard. They said not only this, about 60 kanal State land near Tarnah bridge (Sanyal) is also being grabbed by people and the concerned authorities are well aware of it, the action is yet awaited.
The Panchayat members urged upon the Deputy Commissioner Kathua, Dr Shahid Iqbal to intervene personally otherwise, they along with villagers would block Jammu-Billawar road and hold protest against the authorities.
While the Tehsildar Dinga Amb, Ram Paul was not available for the comments, Assistant Commissioner (Revenue), Kathua Atul Gupta when contacted said that he was not aware of the matter but he assured to hold an inquiry into the matter and get the Government land vacated from the illegal possession of the grabbers.
Executive Engineer, R&B Kathua, K S Nathyal, claimed that as per inputs provided by the concerned AEE, almost all the land belonging to R&B was with the department, but he maintained that he will personally visit the Sub Division to have on the spot assessment in this regard.
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