BENGALURU: Red tapism and unforeseen problems in getting the land survey done could be a thing of the past soon. In about a month, you can take your own tapes and measure your own agricultural land and upload it on a mobile app of the Survey Department.
This is an exercise that has not been tried anywhere in the country. It is expected to bring down massive pendency in the department while not compromising on quality, officials said. Revenue Minister R Ashoka said, "This is a project we have been considering and we have held a meeting to work things out."
The department is planning to introduce the app by November 15 and continue to work on it to make it better and remove the bugs.
Survey Commissioner Mounish Moudgil, who has been the brain behind the idea, told The New Indian Express, "We have been planning this for some months. In the app, people will be allowed to use a digital sketch, which cannot be tampered with. Within their boundaries, they can divide their property any which way they want. Even the time-consuming Podi or division of land can be done digitally. It is obviously not difficult to mark two points on a map. We are putting in safeguards to ensure that it is not misused."
Explaining the app, Moudgil and Additional Director survey CN Sridhar said, "It will be based on satellite images, which will have click points. Once the details are filled in, the app seeks the survey number and other details. To ensure that it is not misused, the app will ask for authentication like the Aadhaar number. If a piece of land is being sold, both the buyer and seller can sit with the map and decide which is the portion that is being sold, and see it online."
Asked if anyone can access the details, they said, "The app will ask for credentials like fingerprint and only then the report is generated."
Every year, the Survey Department gets 7-10 lakh applications for survey sketches for registration, podi or division of land and hudbust or fixing boundaries of land. Pendency has been a major problem and the app is expected to it bring down.