TITLING OF LAND OWNERS

The Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) has geographical area of 2,22,236 Sq. kms. It lies between 32° 10' 12" N to 36° 34' 48" N Latitude and 73° 15' 36" E to 80° 18' 00" E Longitude and is the northern most territory of India, having more than 90% of its territory as mountainous. The UT has around 20,230 sq.kms of its area under forests which accounts for 19.9 % of the geo-graphical area. Out of the total area 825 thousand hectares area is under cultivation which is around 8% of its geographical area.

The total land area includes cultivable, non-cultivable, residential and commercial which is spread across the length and breadth of the region. The landed area has been brought on the map of land revenue records with its titling, for its better management and use by the government of Jammu and Kashmir. Land titling, mapping and updating of records has always been a challenge in land records management. This has been taken and realised under the banner of National Land records modernisation programme (NLRMP) and Digital India land records Modernisation programme (DILRMP). Picking from here and after having working on the land records modernisation programme, we have arrived to our present-day web portal for land records under the banner of Apkizameen ApkiNigrani and a Real time land information system which has been finally realised.

Land Records Maintenance

Maintenance, preservation and updating of land record is done in accordance with Revenue Acts and laws of the UT of Jammu and Kashmir. These acts are guiding factor for making new records at the time of new Settlement. In the present structure, Revenue Department maintains the necessary and major type of documents in the form of Record of Rights (RoR), Jamabandi, Girdawari and Mutation Register (Intikal).

As per the National Land record Modernisation programme (NLRMP) guidelines, Govt. of J&K have created a project management unit (PMU) in the state to address the land records Modernisation programme and subsequent management of the records in the Union Territory. The PMU was registered as Society and named as Jammu & Kashmir Land Records Management Agency (JaKLaRMA). The administrative and functional structure of the society is very comprehensive with inclusion of all covering departments, agencies and office within the UT. The Society is chaired by Chief Secretary and Financial Commissioner Revenue, is the chief executive.

Pertinently, the Digital India Land Records Modernization Programme (DILRMP) was formally launched in the UT in April-2016 for improving online accessibility to the Land Records System and stopping manipulation of the Land Records thereby making quality of services in Sub Registrar offices and Tehsil offices more efficient and transparent. The programme also aims to modernize management of land records, minimize scope of land and property disputes, enhance transparency in the land records maintenance system, and facilitate moving eventually towards guaranteed conclusive titles to immovable properties. The major components of the programme include computerization and digitization of land records, Survey and updation of all settlement records, Integration of property registration with land records and cadastral maps for enhancing authenticity and security of data, bringing utmost transparency in the system, Capacity building and ultimately for development of present-day Land Records Information System.

As part of the program implementation Revenue record and Musavi (maps) have been scanned, besides Ground Control Points have been established, and Web-based Enterprise Geo-Information System (GIS) has been developed.

Full and comprehensive digitalisation and consequent streamlining of land records has been on the cards in order to attend to settlement works in addition to making the entire process of accessing such records by the people in Jammu and Kashmir hassle free, available in transparent and quick mode. To undertake the assignment which is of immense importance due to host of reasons, scanning and digitisation process has been going on under digital India land record modernisation programme.

Objectives of DILRMP Programme

Land record Modernisation programme acts as a single window to handle land records including the maintenance and updating of textual records, maps, survey and settlement operations and registration of immovable property. Next is the mirror principle, which refers to the fact that cadastral records mirror the ground reality and the curtain principle which indicates that the record of title is a true depiction of the ownership status and mutations and registrations are automatically followed and the reference to past records is not necessary.  Final objective being the title insurance, which guarantees the title for its correctness and indemnifies the title holder against loss arising on account of any defect therein.

Land Records Information System

In continuance with the efforts towards digitisation and easy access to records a new web-based land records information system was realised under the banner of AapkiZameen ApkiNigrani. “Land Records Information System” (LRIS) is web based multi-tiered, scalable, reliable, and secure network enterprise application. The LRIS is Integrated, Geographical Information System (GIS) based decision support system to cater 24/7 services to JakLRMa agency user, public user, special agency external user for analysis, evaluation and information of revenue records and its ancillary details like Records of Rights, Jamabandi, Girdawari, Mutation and many more.

AapkiZameen AapkiNigrani

Lieutenant Governor, Manoj Sinha launched the much awaited “AapkiZameen AapkiNigrani” Land Records Information System. In this facility public users can search and view copies of Scanned data online on CIS Portal- http://landrecords.jk.gov.in/. The initiative will facilitate easy online access to the Land Records System, thereby reducing manipulation of the Land Records and improving the efficiency of Revenue offices substantially. With this initiative, under the Digital India Land Records Modernization Programme (DILRMP), the Union Territory of Jammu Kashmir has achieved an important milestone to provide the most transparent & accountable services to the common people.

The initiative leads citizens having any status can utilize the services without approaching the Revenue offices in person. In earlier times it was a time-consuming process to get a revenue extract for self-perusal. As the patwaris are entrusted with a lot of miscellaneous work along with their own work. Although this is a good step from the government it needs more efforts and public support to make it more convenient and reliable.

The initiative has been taken under the Digital India Land Record Modernization Programme (DILRMP), where the Revenue Department has scanned 7,75,70,009 documents, 58,754 maps and 760 jamabandis and placed them in the public domain under the ‘ApniZameen ApniNigrani’ for people’s scrutiny.

Implementation of Real-Time Land Information System

Real time land information system is aimed to give landowners real-time information. Jammu and Kashmir government has initiated a process to implement Real-Time Land Information System (RTLIS) which will provide landholders information about the changes made in their land records on a real-time basis. “For operationalisation of Real-Time Land Information System (RTLIS) seeding of mobile numbers and Aadhar in the land records is a prerequisite.In this regard the process of collection of Aadhar (with consent) and mobile numbers of landowners has already started.

The seeding of Aadhar numbers and mobile numbers of landowners is prerequisite so that the changes in land records, entries made, updation done is made known to the landholders on a real-time basis. The collection of information from PatwarHalqas through the field staff in mission mode through a special campaign – PatwarHalqa awareness cum collection campaign (PHACCC) is in progress, Wherein, besides sensitizing the citizens about the benefits of the initiative, also collection of the mobile numbers and Aadhar of landholders (with consent) is in progress. The PHACCC has been launched in all districts in collaboration with line departments and Panchayati Raj Institutions with maximum use of IEC tools, print and electronic media, social media and at forums like block diwas.

With this system in place the records of the Revenue Department will now be linked with the mobile number and Aadhaar number of the landowner. In this way, disturbances in land-related transactions will be prevented. The landowner will be informed by sending SMS when any process of revenue matters is started.

Importance of public participation and feedback is imperative equally here in this programme in order to make it successful. This participation can be secured by way of sharing Aadhar and mobile phone numbers and is important for realisation of full benefits of real time land Information system. Just like at present with this whole scheme of things we are able to make access to our land records at a click of a button, similarly the day is not far when we will be receiving updates through SMS on our mobile phone for any land records change or any transaction made.

Finally, a long journey from manual records to the digitised ones and its availability online has been a big transformation and an intervention to make a remarkable difference in service delivery as far as easy access to land records is concerned.

(The Author is KAS Officer (Tehsildar). He can be reached on: mubasharamin786@yahoo.com)