Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Seized land was in Tata’s possession, says VS

Staff Reporter

Clarification on Revenue Minister’s statement in Assembly

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan on Thursday made it clear that the land seized by him along with the Special Task Force (STF) at Munnar on Tuesday was in the possession of the Tata group.

The Chief Minister took this position when mediapersons here sought his comments on the reported statement of Revenue Minister K.P. Rajendran in the Assembly that the disputed land actually belonged to the Forest Department and not to the Tata group as was made out by some sections earlier.

“The Forest Department may be supervising the land, and probably it was in that sense the Revenue Minister described it as forest land. Had it not been in Tata’s possession how a name board of the group was being kept there for so many years. I asked this question to the Tata group official T Damu personally, and he did not give an answer,” Mr. Achuthanandan said. When mediapersons persisted that the Revenue Minister had categorically stated that the land belonged to the Forest Department, the Chief Minister quipped: “I do not want to make it an issue of dispute. We (the Revenue Minister and himself) will sort out such issues through mutual discussions. The encroached Government land will be taken back, irrespective of whether it was forest land or revenue land.”

He said he had gone to Munnar to visit the calamity-hit areas there. “When I was there, the STF wanted me to take part in the programme of shifting a name board of the Tata group and installing the Government name board as it marked the beginning of the drive to evict the group from encroached lands. I accepted the request to give moral support to its actions there. This is all that had happened in Munnar.”

Giving a detailed account of the land encroachments in Munnar, the Chief Minister said the Land Board constituted in 1974 as per the Land Act of 1971 had segregated the land in that area as Government land, Tata group’s land and forest land. Much of the Government land was remaining interspersed between the land owned by the Tata group.

No official efforts had been made so far to accurately survey the Government land and to take its possession. So, the Tata group was keeping several portions of such land in their possession with their name boards fixed over them, for the last three decades.

It was only now that the Government launched a systematic initiative to survey such land and to take its possession, the Chief Minister explained.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Health cards for Kudumbasree garbage collection workers
Spare a thought for beggars: Sridevi
‘Government has banking plans’
Achuthanandan’s Munnar campaign a sham, says Chandy
New chief for NSSO
Shift system in schools to go soon
Law on temple entry planned
Uproar in House over ‘threat’ to journalists
Lease land to be taken over
Seized land was in Tata’s possession, says VS
State to evolve disaster management policy
Online registration of engineering, medical options from July 10
‘Government politicising higher education’
Karunakaran turns 89
After ordeal in Nigeria, an emotional reunion for Murugan
Parliamentary panel visits hospitals
Notices to three city colleges
Three Mithun culled at city zoo
Protest over child’s death
Call for changes in fiscal ties between Centre and States

Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu