In what could help thousands of farming families that have been tilling government land without authorisation, the bagair hukum scheme that seeks to regularise such unauthorised cultivation with a fresh cut-off date will be implemented from October.
The announcement by Revenue Minister R.V. Deshpande on Monday comes after the Assembly adopted the Karnataka Land Revenue (Amendment) Bill in February this year that sought to extend the cut-off date for regularisation from April 14, 1990 to January 1, 2005.
“A government order is expected soon. The scheme will most likely come into effect from October 1 and the last date for application is March 16, 2019,” Mr. Deshpande told presspersons here on Monday. The beneficiary families will be getting land parcels up to 2 hectares in this regularisation, he said.
Mr. Deshpande said that since 1991, when unauthorised cultivation of government land started being regularised under bagair hukum scheme, nearly 6 lakh applications have been approved. In all, he said 1.94 lakh applications were still pending, and that the deputy commissioners have been asked to process them quickly.
Incidentally, the amended Act has imposed restrictions on regularisation where the land is within 18 km radius of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike limits or within 10 km radius of other city corporation limits or within 5 km of city municipal councils or within 3 km radius of town municipal councils and town panchayats.
