The state government submitted before the High Court on Tuesday that it has recovered 14,255 acres of government land based on the A T Ramaswamy Commission report. The report had stated that 33,878 acres of government land had been encroached in the city.
The state also submitted before the division Bench of Chief Justice D H Waghela and Justice B V Nagarathna that according to V Balasubramanian, chairman of the Task Force for Recovery of Public Land and its Protection, 11,07,187 acres of government land was illegally encroached by private parties. The court was hearing a PIL filed by founder president of Samaj Parivartan Samudaya S R Hiremath and others. The counsel for the government submitted that the state, in some cases, was not able to recover land as cases were pending before the court.
K V Dhanajay, counsel for the petitioner, said they were not before the court to seek any promises from the government and sought the court to monitor the process of recovering encroached land. In Chikmagalur district alone, 87 influential people had encroached upon 5,000 acres of forest land illegally and none of them were poor, he said.
The bench adjourned the case to Wednesday.