Kartanaka govt ordinance to deal with land grabbers

The state government has decided to issue an ordinance to effectively deal with land grabbers and evict encroachments from government land and even land belonging to shrines.

The state cabinet on Thursday gave its assent to issue the ordinance that would widen the scope of Karnataka Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Bill, which was passed by the state assembly in 2007, but is yet to get the presidential assent.

The bill was returned to the state government in March this year with suggestions to widen its ambit. The government has now incorporated the suggestions and decided to issue an ordinance bringing lands belonging to temples and mutts also under the ambit for eviction of encroachments, higher education minister VS Acharya said after the cabinet meeting.

Properties of the Wakf Board are already covered under the Wakf Act.

It also includes provisions for setting up special courts exclusively to deal with land encroachment cases so that speedy justice could be delivered and the guilty punished without much delay.

According to a recent report prepared by the task force on land encroachment, headed by V Balasubramanian, more than 10,000 pieces of government land have been encroached in the state, which are worth thousands of crores of rupees.