Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed at range levels to deal with land forgery cases will not play any role in brokering compromise between the land mafias and the victims, said Garhwal Range IG/DIG, Sanjay Kumar Gunjyal on Wednesday. On reviewing complaints lodged with SIT, he observed that many of the complainants had withdrawn cases after the accused had returned the money back to them. “This has happened in ten such cases over the past few months. The accused returned the money in fear of languishing in jails and subsequently, the cases were withdrawn,” he said.
“This vindicates the fact that SIT has instilled fear in the land mafias. However, I want to make it clear that SIT will not be used as a platform to broker compromises between the accused and the victims,” he said.
He further said that despite a few land forgery cases having been lodged in Haridwar district, things are grim there too. “The trend of the land mafias duping people for lands whose prices keep spiraling is visible across Garhwal Range. The number of cases being reported from Haridwar is small not because such happenings are rare there but because of the people remaining ignorant of the SIT formed at range level to effectively deal with such cases.
The level of awareness must be raised so that the people approach the SIT once such cases befall them,” he added.
He further said that around 200 complaints related to land forgery have been reported. Acting on 36 complaints, FIRs have been registered in police stations concerned after SIT officials had completed thorough investigation.
As complaints related to false land registry are on the rise SIT would increase the number of sub-inspectors to speed things up. Two more sub-inspectors will be
included.
Apart from this, retired Naib Tehsidars and Tehsidars will be inducted in the
SIT. Some of them are interested too to work with the
SIT. “The State Government would decide the amount to be paid to them,” Gunjyal added.