Amid uproar, Assembly passes revenue grants

Tribune News Service

Jammu, January 17

The Legislative Assembly today passed grants of Revenue, Relief & Rehabilitation and Hajj and Auqaf for 2017-18 amid a walkout by National Conference (NC) legislators, who were not satisfied with the replies to their cut motions.

NC legislators Ali Mohammad Sagar and Mohammad Akbar Lone staged a walkout when Minister for Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation Basharat Bukhari did not give them a satisfactory answer.

Earlier, while responding to the discussion on demand of grants, Bukhari called the Revenue Department as the backbone of the administration.

He said several innovative measures were underway for revitalising the department by undertaking digitisation of records, constitution of a high-level committee for land use planning, besides a committee for the evacuee property.

Welcoming the points raised by the legislators, the minister said the inputs presented by people’s representatives and their consideration and resolution by the government was part of the democratic process and aided in achieving progressive growth.

For facilitating the settlement process and providing effective online platform for resolving grievances, the Revenue Minister informed the House that the department was making all efforts for e-profiling the areas of 22 districts, 67 sub-divisions, 217 territorial tehsils, 558 niabats and 1,553 patwar halqas and 6,959 villages.

The minister said the Centre had introduced the prestigious Rs 375-crore Digital Land Records Modernization Programme to bring uniformity in the land record management system across the country to modernise land records, minimise disputes, enhance transparency and public delivery system.

He said while Jammu and Srinagar districts had been taken up in phase-I on a pilot basis, the remaining districts will also be taken up subsequently.

Later, the House with voice vote passed the Rs 2,38,450.24-lakh grants of revenue, relief and rehabilitation, Haj and Auqaf for 2016-17, which were moved by the minister.