NEW DELHI, Aug 9:
A bill will be brought in the next session of Parliament to guide states in completion of digitisation of land records, mutations and maps by 2017 so that individuals can become “conclusive” owners of property, the Lok Sabha was informed today.
Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh said during Question Hour that computerisation of land records had been completed in almost all states except Bihar, Kerala, Jammu and Kashmir and Jharkhand.
He said land record computerisation and digitisation, which is mainly the responsibility of the states, has been completed in 267 districts of the country and the Centre is confident of covering all 620 districts by 2017 when the 12th Plan draws to a close.
He said the Government is working on bringing a Model Title Bill in the Winter session.
“In India one is a presumptive and not a conclusive owner of land unless proved otherwise,” Ramesh said, adding that once the digitisation of land records – which entails providing map of the land, mutation, photo ID and so on – is completed the country can move towards conclusive ownership.
The Government had launched the ambitious National Land Records Modernisation Programme in 2008-09 for this purpose.
Ramesh hailed the erstwhile Operation Barga of West Bengal in which land ownership was given to share-croppers as well and wished this was done by other states too. But they have not done so despite several requests by the Centre. Ramesh said a major cause of delay in computerisation and subsequent digitisation of land records is that surveys have not been done for several decades.
“It is true that state of land records in the country is very poor. The last land census was done in 1907, in Andhra Pradesh in 1921 and in Uttar Pradesh in 1957,” he said.
Ramesh praised states like Karnataka and Gujarat – both ruled by BJP – for completing most of the digitisation programme. “Karnataka has ‘bhoomi’ programme and Gujarat has ‘dhara’ where photo ID cards, boundary maps are a part of the records,” he said.
He said other states which have done reasonably well are Andhra Pradesh, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh.
Ramesh pointed out that there is shortage of land surveyors due to which this work is progressing at a slow pace. A national institute for training surveyors is being set up at Neemrana in Rajasthan, he said.
The Minister maintained that the primary responsibility of training surveyors is that of the states. (PTI)
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