Et Report
SRINAGAR, Feb 24 : The Jammu and Kashmir High Court has asked the state government to file objections within two weeks in a case related to the misappropriation of funds and illegal sale of land by revenue officials in famous tourist resort Pahalgam. A petition regarding the Pahalgam land scam was filed by Ghulam Mohi-ud-Din Mir, a resident of Laripora in Pahalgam in the high court through his council Parvez Imroz. Advocate Imroz said the petitioner had been wronged by the revenue officials, like other people of Pahalgam, that his land which is mortgaged with the bank has been grabbed by land mafia through fraudulent revenue records.
He said the petitioner had stated that in 13 villages of Pahalgam, land mafia is operating in connivance with the revenue officials who are grabbing the land of locals by fraudulent power of attorneys, sale-deeds and mutation without their knowledge and approval. The petitioner, on behalf of people of Pahalgam through his council, informed the court that the entire land record has been changed fraudulently after revenue records were gutted in 1970 and 1983. "The revenue officials in connivance with the land mafia are alienating the propertied and even non-propertied land and forest land to the outsiders particularly to people from Srinagar though the actual owners are living on such land and the land alienated on changed khasra numbers are being shown on other places," the counsel for the petitioner told the court. Informing the court that no action was being taken against the guilty and that the practice continued unabated, the counsel said that even in one case the crime branch has filed FIR number 10/2010 under section 420, 468, 471, 120 B of RPC against this fraudulent sale deeds but the accused persons have not been punished and nobody knows what happened to that case.The counsel informed the court that the petitioner is also a victim as his land mortgaged to State Bank of India has also been sold through fraudulent sale-deeds. Taking cognizance of the allegations, the court directed the government to file its objections within two weeks. |
