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Big industrialists figure in encroachment: Panel

Staff Reporter

`750 acres in reserve forest area in Bannerghatta encroached upon'

RECOVERING LOST GROUND: Members of the Joint Legislature Committee, headed by A.T. Ramaswamy (in front), inspecting a site at N.S. Palya in Bangalore on Wednesday.

Bangalore: The Joint Select Committee of the Legislature on Encroachment of Government Land in and around Bangalore has said that prominent industrialists are among those allegedly involved in the encroachment of 750 acres of reserved forest in Bannerghatta National Park.

Committee chairman and MLA A.T. Ramaswamy told presspersons here on Wednesday that the names of Kumaramangalam Birla and B.P. Kumar Birla figure in the list of encroachers.

The Bannerghatta National Park covers 26,675 acres of reserved forest area.

Reading out from documents provided to him by the Forest Department officials, without elaborating on the identity of the person, Mr. Ramaswamy said that 1.62 hectares of forestland in Jigani hobli of Anekal taluk was registered under the name of Mr. Kumaramangalam Birla.

Racket suspected

Mr. Ramaswamy said the buyers could not have acquired land inside the reserved forest area without the knowledge of the Forest Department officials.

"After going through all details of the encroachment, it looks like the Forest Department officials and the Revenue Department officials are hand-in-glove and have helped them acquire the land," he said.

He said the Revenue Department officials had facilitated the encroachment through false possession certificates provided to the violators of the law.

BDA criticised

The Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) has come under fire for allowing encroachments in its layouts.

According to the Committee, 2,112 acres of BDA land had been encroached upon and the market value of this land was over Rs. 10,000 crore.

Mr. Ramaswamy along with the former Minister Roshan Baig, MLA S.Raghu, MLC Munivenkatappa Reddy and V. Balasubramanian, who comprise the committee, visited eight layouts, accompanied by BDA officials. The layouts were Yelanakunte, Roopena Agrahara, N.S. Palya, BTM Layout 4th Stage, Konanakunte, Kothanur, Yediyur Nagasandra and Vishwabharati Housing Society in Hosakerehalli.

In Yelanakunte (survey no.31) in Begur village, 15.11 acres of land had been encroached upon. In 2003, the Revenue Department handed over this land to BDA for creation of layouts. Already 138 sites, worth Rs. 350 crore had been created, of which 113 had been allotted.

Mr. Ramaswamy said after inspecting the layouts. He said he had written to the BDA Chairman seeking an explanation and asked him to take action in this matter in a week's time.

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