Govt gears up to recover pending payments against EP, Auqaf land
Jammu: Minister for Revenue, Hajj & Auqaf and Parliamentary Affairs, Abdul Rehman Veeri has directed the Evacuee Property and Auqaf Department to take serious efforts for realizing the all pending rent amount and payment against its land acquired by various government department and agencies. The Minister has also asked all Land Collectors to look into all these cases and release the said payments at the earliest besides asked Administrators Auqaf to follow the cases on regular basis.
The Minister gave these directions while chairing a high-level meeting with senior officers to review the status of outstanding on account of rentals/land compensation against various departments in respect of EP and Auqaf department.
During the meeting, Custodian General J&K briefed the meeting about the outstanding on account of rentals against various government departments including Police, Estates, Health, Education, Agriculture, Sheep Husbandry, Public Works, Defence and other centre government agencies.
After having deliberate discussions on the issue department wise, the Minister asked all the officers representing their department to look into the issue and take steps to release the outstanding dues at the earliest.
Veeri asked Custodian General to reconcile the data and to share it with all concerned departments so that process is initiated for payment.
“All the long pending cases in which rent against land/structures has not been provided by the government departments needs to be taken up at higher level for redressal”, the Minister said adding that such cases should be first taken up with Commissioner Secretary Revenue so that can be discussed at the Administrative Secretaries level.
While discussing the rental arrangement for the EP land being utilized by the Agriculture department, Minister for Agriculture, Ghulam Nabi Lone Hanjura asked the EP department to reconsider the revised rates as they are considerably higher than the earlier rates.
The meeting was also informed that as per the decision of Chief Minister, a Committee has to be constituted to work out the modalities to clear all the pending liabilities including of Agriculture department.
It was informed that till the Committee come up with its recommendations; Agriculture department will pay the basic rent to EP department.
With regard to issues of land presently under possession of defence agencies, the Minister asked Principal Secretary Home, Raj Kumar Goyal to take up the matter with Director Estates, Defence so that pending rent/other issues are resolved in timely manner.
Besides, the status of payment against land compensation cases of Evacuee Property department was also discussed briefly during the meeting. The Custodian General apprised the meeting about the details of the EP land acquired by government departments/agencies for development projects and their payment status district wise.
KV Correspondent
