While the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is yet to initiate a thorough probe in the 25,000 crore Roshni land scam, the Jammu & Kashmir Government has now decided to implement the High Court order which had earlier declared the Jammu & Kashmir State Land (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act, 2001, as amended from time to time as unconstitutional, contrary to law and unsustainable.
Acting on the directions of the High Court the J&K Government has also directed the Principal Secretary Revenue Department to ensure that all the mutations done in furtherance of the Act are annulled, encroachers are evicted and large tracts of land are retrieved within a period of six months.
On 9 October, a division bench of Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice Rajesh Bindal ordered the CBI probe into irregularities in the scheme and directed the agency to file a status report every eight weeks.
On Saturday an order issued by the Jammu and Kashmir Department of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, with the approval of the Lt Governor, stated that the government has been found necessary in the order to implement the judgment passed by the court on a PIL and other connected matters.
“Now, therefore, it is hereby ordered that the principal secretary to the government, revenue department, shall pass an order declaring all actions taken under the Jammu and Kashmir State Land (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act, 2001, as amended from time to time, and rules made thereunder as void ab-initio,” the spokesman of J&K government said quoting the order. He said it would be ensured that all the mutations done in furtherance of the act are annulled.
The principal secretary will also work out a plan to retrieve the large tracts of state land vested under the act in a time-bound manner, the spokesman said.
He said the secretary will also work out the modalities and a plan to evict encroachers from such state Land and retrieve it within six months.
The officer would also work out modalities for handling the money received for these lands after the annulment, the spokesman said.
The secretary will also ensure that information regarding district-wise state land, as of 1 January, is complied and posted on official websites with details of land that has been encroached, he said.
“The details of the applications received under the act, the valuation of land, amounts paid by the beneficiary, the orders passed under the act, and the persons in whose favour the vesting was done and also... further transfers, if any, recognised and accepted by the authorities” should be posted on the websites, the spokesman said.
The details should also include, “complete identities of all influential persons (including ministers, legislators, bureaucrats, government officials, police officers, businessmen) their relatives or persons holding benami for them, who have derived benefit under the act or occupy state lands”, he said.
The action would be completed within a period of one month, the spokesman said.
Divisional commissioners of Jammu as well as of the Kashmir region will place on the record before the high court the details of encroached state land not covered by the act, he said.