One owner ploughs land, other reaps the benefit under Rythu Bandhu scheme
HYDERABAD: When 55-year-old Md Qutubuddin Gori visited the Mandal Revenue Office in his village a couple of months ago, he was in for a surprise. The six acres of land that he had bought with his hard-earned money was no longer just his.
Qutubuddin found from the officials that the parcel of land, located in Kothapalli village of Yacharam, was now registered in the name of two different individuals. While he ploughs the land, the other reaps the benefits. These benefits include those from the much-hyped Rythu Bandhu scheme of the Telangana government. In fact, these irregularities would not have seen the light of the day, if the government's investment support scheme for the landholding farming community was not implemented.
Qutubuddin and his sons had purchased the land under survey number 208, back in 2001. They had also filed an application for the mutation of this land with the Mandal Revenue Office in 2007, and got the revenue records officially transferred to their names within three months. Following this, the tahsildar issued a patta passbook to them in 2008.
However, in 2018, the State government's decision to reissue the pattadar passbooks to farmers across the State, changed things around. Qutubuddin waited for a long time to get his new passbook, but it never came. It was then that he decided to go personally to the Mandal Revenue Office and make an enquiry, only to find that his land was now under somebody else's name.
Speaking to Express, Qutubuddin said: "I found out that the wrongdoer who bought my land had bribed the revenue officials and got the pattadar passbook. This is a clear case of the high-handedness of revenue officials. My records are all clear."
An official with the Sub Registrar Office of Ibrahimpatnam, on the condition of anonymity, told Express that the double registration could have taken place using forged documents. "They will be prosecuted as per law," he added.
A Pushpalatha, tahsildar of Yacharam, said that if there was a double registration issue, they should go to the civil court and file a dispute. When probed on why Qutubuddin was denied the passbook, she said: "The Revenue Divisional Officer can cancel the passbook if it was issued to the wrong person."