The Comptroller Auditor and General has found irregularities in Karnataka government’s land grant as well as in the land usage and eviction of encroachment. The CAG has found that approximately 117 acres of government land was granted against the norms to over two dozen beneficiaries which included the Congress party too.
According to the Karnataka Land Grant Rules, 1969, grant of land is not allowed to political parties but this rule was overlooked to grant 60 guntas (Scale to measure land) of land to the Congress party in order to construct its office in Channapatna in October 2015. Similarly, 15 acres were given to the Karnataka Government Secretariat Group-D Employees Association in the Bengaluru (North). This was done despite the fact that grants of land are not allowed to any association for residential purposes.
These findings are part of the CAG report which is named, ‘Grant, Lease, Eviction of Encroachment and Regularisation of Unauthorised Occupation of Government Land’ and on Monday, this was tabled in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly.
The report had a random sample of 30 taluks from 11 districts and these cases belonged to the period between 2012-13 and 2016-17. The auditor found deficiencies in inventory management (database of lands available), the procedure in allotment of applications seeking the grant of land, monitoring of land usage and eviction of encroachment.
390.38 acres of land in 10 cases were granted despite “incorrect or incomplete verification” of the status of these lands. For example, 7 acres of land was granted to the Bengaluru Institute of Higher Education and Research in Bengaluru East in January 2014 and 2 acres to Dr. Vishnuvardhan Smaraka in Bengaluru (South) taluk. The report mentions that till March 2017, 4.48 lakh acres of land remained under encroachment. The audit report also found that in 43 cases where the encroachments were to be cleared, 22 cases involving 219 acres of land continued encroached.
The CAG also detected that 89 acres of encroached land was granted by the government authorities to the encroachers in Bengaluru (Urban), Ballari, Mysuru and Ramnagara districts. Furthermore, the encroachers used these lands to build resorts, golf villages, schools, and churches.
After tracing these shortcomings, the CAG also pointed out towards the revenue department that allowed “ineligible” modification in the land that was worth Rs. 176.01 crore in 51 cases. The recipient of this concession included Matha Amritanandamayi Math, Srinivasa Educational and Charitable Trust, Sri Janaseva Vishwastha Mandali (all Bengaluru). The revenue department had dispersed concession worth Rs. 19.61 crore in five of the cases “without application by the beneficiary or recording any reason for the same”.
Earlier, a major scam had unearthed in Karnataka worth Rs 410 crore. The scam had been unearthed in the implementation of the rural job scheme, Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA). The scheme provides 100 days of employment to the unskilled laborers in rural areas at a payment of Rs. 236 for every day of work. However, the scheme had been susceptible to ghost payment and workdays. It was also reported that Karnataka is banking heavily on this scheme in order to mitigate the effects of drought. However, a social audit was carried out which flagged irregularities amounting to Rs 410 crore this year.
The irregularities include payments for work not done, payments in excess of work done, double payments and payments in excess of the bill amount. The audit looked into MNREGA in 467 Gram Panchayats across the state of Karnataka. More than 92,000 cases of irregularities were flagged in the audit. The audit confirmed the leakages worth Rs 37.68 crore. Apart from this, Rs. 373 crore has been put on hold due to audit objections. The irregularities found in these two cases raise finger on Congress party which has ruled the state for many years and formed an unholy alliance to rule the state of Karnataka with the JD(S).