Revenue failure exposed in land notification

By VL Srinivasan

Published on April 1, 2007

Hyderabad: The recent controversy surrounding the sale of 392 acres of Government land at Nadergul by some Congress leaders has once again brought to light the failure of the Revenue department in notifying such valuable properties, particularly, in and around the twin cities.
The Revenue department, which has to notify the Government lands and advise general public from time to time against buying such lands, failed to do so leading to present mess.
It may be mentioned here that the erstwhile Nizam gave about 969 acres at Nadergul as Inam to one of his loyalists Sivaraj Bahadur. However, the Office of Jagir Administrator paid Rs 35,14,813 to nine descendants of
Sivaraj Bahadur and took possession of these lands in 1959.
However, some Congress leaders from East Godavari district allegedly encroached them claiming that they were the real owners of these lands and sold them to different people four months ago.
Though the State Government amended the Registration Act in 1999 by inserting a Section empowering it to issue notifications to be published in the official gazette declaring registration of any document or class of
documents as opposed to public policy which restrained the sub-registrars from registering such documents, it was struck down by the High Court which declared the provisions of the said Section as unconstitutional in 2003.
Even the Special Leave Petition filed by the State Government in the Supreme Court was dismissed.
According to AP Sub-Registrars Association general secretary D Vishnuvardhan Raju, when the Section was in force, the State Government issued notifications on the basis of which the sub-registrars did not register any documents relating to notified properties. At present, there is no such mechanism.
Subsequently, the State Government in its memo No 10234/RegnI(1)/2006-3 dated March 18, 2006, issued clear instructions not to refuse registrations except under specific statutory provisions in legislations like Assigned
Lands (P.O.T) Act.
``There are certain requirements under the Assigned Lands (P.O.T) Act, the Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act and the AP Land Reforms Act and if any party complies with them, the sub-registrars are bound to register the documents,'' he told Express.
However in some instances, the sub-registrars are not registering the documents relating to Government lands as they have information in respect of such lands.
In the absence of any information about the government lands or assigned lands with them, the sub-registrars cannot refuse registration of the documents.
``Registration and refusal are governed by statutory provisions and no document can be refused without statutory support. It is unfortunate that the sub-registrars are held responsible for the irregular land transfers,'' he said.
Further, Rule 58 of the Registration Rules specifically prohibits the sub-registrars from verification of the title which has been upheld by the courts also, he said.