Agency to acquire land for GMADA

In order to avoid an inordinate delay in its land acquisition process due to staff crunch, the Greater Mohali Area Development Authority (GMADA) of Punjab, an authority responsible for the development of the Greater Mohali Area, would hire Land Acquisition Facilitating Consultant (LAFC) for meeting its long-term needs.

According to sources, this will help the department in accelerating the acquisition process by outsourcing some of the facilitation work relating to land acquisition. The facilitator, say the sources, will prepare land acquisition plan and notification under section 4 and section 6. According to sources, the hired agency, initially, would prepare land plan which will be done after finalisation of design. The procedure to be followed in the preparation of the proposed new land acquisition plan are — collecting photocopies of village revenue maps from the revenue department, to collect engineering design, superimpose designs on village revenue maps etc.

 

The facilitators will also prepare notification under section 4 & 6 involved in land acquisition process which includes collecting ownership details, record of rights, record objections under section 5 of the Land Acquisition Act, distribution of notices to the land owners about the date of objection or land acquisition proceeding under section 6 of the Land Acquisition Act 1894, and also to prepare reply of objections.

The source further informed the appointed facilitator will also prepare compensation sheet as per collectorate rate of the state government. Besides, the agency would be also responsible for disbursement of compensation.

Timely disbursement of compensation is one of the major challenges under facilitation because land records in the villages are not updated on time, transfer of land could not be recorded because the properties are inherited, persons living abroad and prevalence of unrecorded tenure.

So the facilitator has to update land record with the help of patwaris, public consultation and sensitisation of people about the requirement of actual owner of properties, distribution of cheques in public meeting in the villages or Tehsils, in case of land pooling, preparation of detailed land pooling plan in, consultation with GMADA; seeking applications from the land owners and their compilations ; preparing the compiled statement and putting it on the website inviting objections from the land owners; finalising the land pooling component; preparation of Letters of Intent and their disbursal to the landowners.

Further, once the disbursement is done, he land will be acquired, demarcated and land will be transferred in the name of GMADA in the revenue record. All kinds of assistance for updation of revenue record as well as taking possession from the landowners would be provided.

According to the sources, this will not only speed up the process of land acquisition but also save resources resulting in inordinate delay in projects. The state government acquires land for road projects, commercial and other development projects, so the hired agency will work hand in hand with the state government. The state government has plans to acquire land for Medicity, Education hub etc.