Farmer alleges inaction by district collector in land case

A farmer has accused revenue officials of wrongly registering some persons as owners of a 50-acre land near Lonavla in contravention of court orders and alleged that the district collector, Chandrakant Dalvi, had not conducted any inquiry into the matter despite an order by the state information commissioner, Vijay Kuvalekar, about four months ago.

The issue is related to land in Sadapur village, 4 km from Lonavla. The estimated market price of the land is around Rs20 crore. A farmer, Nathu Sakharam Gaikwad, from Kambarenama village, 22 km from Lonavla, has been
pursuing the matter.

Gaikwad told DNA on Tuesday that after court orders in a bogus sale deed case during 1980s, names of six villagers were restored in revenue records in 1988. However, in 1989, the revenue officials wrongly entered the names of SS Gokhale, NS Biradi and SK Anand in the revenue records of the land.

Gaikwad said that he had sought details on entry of names in revenue records under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, but did not receive any information in the matter. He ultimately had to file an application with the state information commission (SIC), Pune bench.

Kuvalekar passed an order on July 24 asking the district collector to initiate a thorough investigation into the entry of wrong names in revenue record and submit a report to the SIC by August 30. He had also asked the district collector to provide the applicant with all details regarding the change in names of land holders, which were earlier entered as per the Supreme Court’s (SC) order.

He had also asked the district collector to inform the applicant in writing if no documentary evidence in the case was available. Gaikwad said that he had not received any information on the matter from the district collector.

Kuvalekar had also asked the district collector to file a criminal complaint against the revenue officials, who were responsible for the loss of documents on the basis of which the names of Gokhale and others were entered in the
revenue records.