No role for middlemen in land grievance redressal, says Collector

District Collector M. N. Harendhira Prasad on Monday cautioned revenue officials against allowing middlemen to interfere in land-related issues and warned of strict action, including suspension, for any deviation from prescribed procedures.

Addressing tahsildars and divisional-level revenue officers at a Revenue Clinic held at the Collectorate VC Hall, the Collector said complaints had been received that petitions were being accepted only on the recommendations of middlemen or political leaders. He described such practices as unacceptable and stressed that applications from all citizens must be received without bias.

The Collector, who attended the programme along with Joint Collector K. Mayur Ashok, instructed officials to resolve land grievances at Revenue Clinics to the maximum extent possible. He said people should not be made to run from one office to another for the same issue and cautioned against avoidable delays in processing applications.

He directed digital assistants not to reject petitions for want of documents and said applications should be accepted and registered even if only a survey number was provided. Officials were also asked to focus on areas with a high incidence of land disputes and to examine each case thoroughly before taking a decision.

Later, at the Revenue Clinic conducted under the supervision of the Joint Collector, Visakhapatnam and Bheemili Revenue Divisional Officers Sudha Sagar and Sangeet Madhur, along with tahsildars from all mandals, received petitions from the public.

Officials heard grievances, conducted on-the-spot inquiries, updated petitioners on the status of their cases and explained the steps being taken to resolve the issues.

A total of 137 petitions were received during the clinic, covering survey-related matters, deletion from the 22A prohibited list, land regularisation, mutation and other revenue-related issues.