Excelsior Correspondent
VIJAYPUR, May 30: Apni Party, Provincial President Jammu and Former Minister Manjit Singh today conducted a tour of Mananu in Samba District and interacted with the Below Poverty Line families whose land was taken over by a Government Department.
Former Minister Manjit Singh was accompanied by District President Samba Raman Thappa during the tour.
“It is very unfortunate that the District Administration has snatched agricultural land from the poor villagers who have no other source of income. The Administration should have worked for their welfare. We appeal to the administration to rethink their decision and return the land to the farmers,” said Manjit Singh.
He said that the people of the village held these lands for over 100 years, much before the Indian Independence. “The villagers have claims over the land and it must be returned to them,” he said after hearing their concerns and the revenue records which shows them as the caretakers of the land.
In 2012, he recalled that a deputation of then Revenue Minister, Raman Bhalla, then MP late Madan Lal Sharma, then Deputy Commissioner, Samba, Mubarak Singh, and he had visited the village and it was decided on spot that the Krishi Vigyan Kendra will be given an alternative land and the villagers will neither be dislocated nor their land will be snatched.
Going against the decision of the democratically elected Government and its representatives, he said, the District Administration adopted an adamant attitude which is not acceptable and it has shown that the bureaucracy is not good for the people of J&K.
“The LG must intervene and safeguard the interest of the poor people and return the retrieved land to them. The Administration must be asked to explain as to why the poor people were harassed in the pandemic situation,” he said.
He said that the Krishi Vigyan Kendra can be given an alternative land as per the decision of then Revenue Minister, but the administration has done injustice to the poor people.
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