Taking back encroached lands turning out to be mammoth task

Land grabbers alleged to have backing from leaders of ruling party

Kadapa: Taking back of assigned lands that are illegally occupied is turning out to be a mammoth task for district administration. Inability expressed by Endowments Department during recent Assembly Assurance Committee meeting over taking back of Goondala Neelakanteswara Swamy temple lands in Yerraguntla despite the High Court verdict, stands a testimony.

It may be recalled that 90 per cent of the petitions being received by the administration during grievance day were land-related issues. Collector K V Satyanarayana deployed 7 RDO’s to take back the lands but the task was daunting as the land grabbers were allegedly backed by the leaders of the ruling party.

According to the sources, about 1 lakh acres are under illegal occupation at village level. About 70 per cent of assigned lands in 51 mandals were also under occupation.

In this back drop the administration has proposed to take criminal action against the land grabbers, if they did not hand over the lands in amicable manner. They cited incident in Nellore district, where the administration has booked criminal cases against 200 land grabbers.

It may be recalled that district collector K V Satyanarayana during the recent Assembly Assurances Committee meeting declared that he would take back lands from the land grabbers at all costs.

“Keeping view of large number of petitions related to the land grabbing during grievance days, I will settle the issues in coming two months,” he vowed.