JOAO SOUSA M |NT
Quepem
The process for ‘transfer of land’ under Forest Rights Act was initiated way back in 2012, however, a little progress has been made on that till now due to the complicated documentation process involved and administrative hurdles.
Ground Zero investigation in villages of Balli, Barcem and Morpilla revealed that even though the official count of FRA claims stands at 1,840, there could be hundreds who are ‘caught in the lengthy procedure.’
Many claimants are confused over the area, coming under ‘two different revenue and administrative village panchayats.
The government had earlier made 75 per cent quorum at the gram sabhas mandatory for approval of such proposals.
Sources informed that till date, the panchayats face a lot of confusion as the directions are not clear besides the complicated documentation process involved.
An official said the process was first initiated in 2012, and it took nearly four years to prepare the list of claimants, however, the major hurdle was the documentation process.
He said that a family geneology was introduced, besides written statement from the eldest member of the family and self-declarations.
Subsequently, the files were forwarded to the office of the BDO in 2016, who in turn had forwarded the same to the office of Deputy Collector, who eventually returned the files back to village panchayat to complete the documentation properly.
The official said that the office of the Deputy Collector asked for affidavits in place of the self-declarations, however, many of such claimants had already passed away by the time the files had come back and the entire process had to be carried out once again.
A resident of Morpilla Rama Velip (name changed) informed that “there are officially 215 claimants in the village. However, there could be another 100-odd, who have not applied as there is a lot of confusion among the people. We do not know who are supposed to apply. We have not been informed properly.”
He said that “many tribals, post- liberation were given survey numbers while others were not, and it was under kumeri cultivation. We do not know if the survey numbers given then are valid or have to be taken afresh under the new Forest Rights Act. There are over 100 people who have not applied.”
He said that post-liberation, the then chief minister the late Babusaheb Bandodkar had started the process of giving survey numbers for these kumeri cultivators, however, due to some reason the process stopped and everything came to a standstill. We are not educated, and hence we do not know what has to be done nor do the panchayats do.”
An official from the office of the BDO informed that a major issue has been the clause which required 75 per cent quorum at the gram sabha, which has now been relaxed to 50 per cent. Further, the files are not making much headway over disagreement of the allotted land and the land claimed by the claimants.
The official said that “Balli panchayat has approved 35 files, while 22 files are okayed by Barcem panchayat, and 16 files from Paddi have been processed so far, and are being forwarded to the office of the Deputy Collector.”
The official admitted that just about 10 per cent of the total files have been completed so far.
Balli sarpanch Prageeta Velip informed that the survey is presently being held at Adnem, however, “we are facing a lot of difficulties due to the complexity of the documentation process. The files are getting held up as the authorities are asking for physical proof which is extremely difficult to provide. Secondly many of the elderly people have passed away and we would prefer better guidance from the government to dedicatedly resolve the issue of claims under Forest Rights Act.
