Govt paid Rs 9 cr to buy its own land

Md A Basith / TNN / Mar 27, 2006, 01:09 IST

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State govt paid 'compensation' to hundreds of squatters to get control of its own land for the Shamshabad international airport.

HYDERABAD: The state government paid 'compensation' to hundreds of squatters to get control of its own land to make place for the Shamshabad international airport, an inquiry by the Vigilance & Enforcement (V&E) wing has found.
In unearthing this Rs 9 crore payout to squatters, the investigators also stumbled on a curious fact: much of the Shamshabad land belonging to the government was still recorded as owned by one Mir Osman Ali Khan, the seventh Nizam of Hyderabad.
While unravelling a taxing tangle of old land records, V&E investigators found that documents relating to more than 100 acres had gone missing altogether.
They came up against a wall of silence when they asked for the names of the mandal revenue officers (MROs) who were in office when these transactions were made.

Finally discovered, disciplinary action has been recommended against four MROs and two mandal revenue inspectors (MRIs) of Saroornagar mandal.
The inquiry revealed that the government aqcuired 1,137 acres of its own land in Saroornagar mandal for the aiport project: 45 acres in Galwaguda village, 70.23 acres in Gollapally Khurd, 23.25 acres in Gollapally Kalan, 174.17 acres in Anantha Reddyguda, 910.54 acres in Mamidipally and 121 acres in Rasheedguda.

Squatters walked away with Rs 8.76 crore for selling unto the government what was its by right. This largesse was ladled out as ex gratia at the rate of Rs 65,000 per acre as per GO Ms No. 6. dated Jan. 7, 2004.
Officials found that vast tracts of government land in the footprint of the airport project had been encroached. In survey no. 99/1 alone, the extent of land lost to squatters was 2,131.38 acres.
The V&E sleuths had to delve into decades-old records to nail the ownership of the land. Many of these occupied tracts were thus discovered to be owned by the government. As per the pahani extracts (land records), survey no. 43/30 in Rasheedguda village was government land. Likewise, survey nos. 4, 67, 92, 104, 107, 112, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 208 and 209 in Gollapally Khurd village, survey nos 162 and 165 in Galwaguda, survey nos 8, 23, 72, 77, 79, 118, 125 and 144 in Ananth Reddyguda.
Some of the documents still show Mir Osman Ali Khan, the seventh Nizam, as the pattadar. For example land under survey number 99/1 in Mamidipally village acquired by the forest department in 1956 and transferred to the animal husbandry department in 1966, but this is not reflected in the village records.
With the local administration asleep, land around Shamshabad was increasingly nibbled up squatters. For example, there were 64 encroachers recorded in Mamidipally village in 1971-72. This number jumbed to 258 in 1991-92.
The MROs of Shamshabad and Saroornagar failed to furnish the pahani extracts and were even unable to come up with a list of MROs/tahsildars who served between 1959 and 1984.
So how did the government end up paying for its own land? Apparently, when land was being acquired for the airport project, the surveyor of Saroornagar mandal, while submitting his survey reports to the special tahsildar for land acquisition, stated that in several cases he had gone by the accounts of the individuals in possession of land.
For these acts of negligence, the V&E inquiry has recommended disciplinary action against a succession of four Saroornagar MROs: Sunder Abraham (Feb. 7, 2002 to March 21, 2003), Param Jothi (March 22, 2003 to Dec. 18, 2003), Prabhakar Reddy (Dec. 19, 2003 to Feb. 20, 2004) and Prasad Rao (incumbent since Feb. 20, 2004).
Disciplinary action has also been sought against MRIs Aswaq (Feb. 6, 2002 to June 2, 2004) and Ravi Kumar (incumbent since June 3, 2004).
The inquiry also recommended criminal proceedings against the encroachers who were paid compensation illegally. And what of the Nizam? The V&E suggested that the name of Mir Osman Ali Khan be deleted from the revenue records and replaced with the government's lest it encourage his heirs to launch another wave of litigation.

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