The Hindu : Front Page : Plea to free Lord Lingaraj’s lands

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Wednesday, May 21, 2008
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Plea to free Lord Lingaraj’s lands

Staff Reporter

CAA resents ‘inaction’ on the part of departments concerned

BHUBANESWAR: Land-grabbing seems to be at its peak in the State capital with land sharks not sparing even the properties of Lord Lingaraj, the presiding deity of the city.

Valuable pieces of land were gobbled up by various individuals as well as organisations, alleged the Citizens Apex Association (CAA) and demanded the intervention of Governor Murlidhar Chandrakant Bhandare.

According to a CAA study, there were 1523.879 acres of land in the name of Lord Lingaraj in 1962 land settlement records.

“During last 10 years, no land has been sold or given on lease as reported.

The present position of Lord Lingaraj’s lands is not known. Large chunks of the Lord’s land have been misappropriated,” the CAA alleged.

The citizens’ forum urged the State government to convene a meeting for reviewing the status of these lands.

“In the settlement records, 33.767 acres of land has been shown as encroachment by individuals and 4.795 acres of land has been wrongly recorded either in name of individuals or government departments,” CAA president N. K. Panda said.

Cases filed

He said in order to release the encroached land measuring 19.536 acres, the temple administration had filed 174 cases in the court of Endowments Commissioner to evict the encroachers.

Of the 174 cases, 136 cases filed in respect of 15.774 acres had already been disposed of and 38 cases were still pending, Mr. Panda, who is a former Chief Secretary of Orissa, said.

He said although many cases had been ruled in favour of the temple administration, lands were not brought into possession.

Revision petition

Similarly, the Orissa Estate Abolition revision case filed in the court of Board of Revenue in 1995 for release of land of Lord Lingaraj had been pending for more than 12 years, the CAA pointed out.

“As it appears, neither the government nor the temple administration is bothered to release the lands of Lord Lingaraj.

The encroachers have occupied the land without any hindrance and even action initiated for eviction of encroachers has been dragging for 17 years.

If the matter is delayed like this, the temple administration will be forced to surrender the lands to the encroachers,” Mr. Panda said. The CAA urged the Commissioner of Endowments and the Board of Revenue to deal with the pending cases expeditiously.

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