Jammu, Dec 4
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Secretary on Wednesday held a meeting of the Revenue Department and took an assessment of the progress made in the digitisation of land records in J&K.
An official statement said that the Chief Secretary impressed upon the officers of the Department to take earnest steps to complete the digitisation programme, as most of the work has been shown to be completed now. He observed that the next goal of the Department should be to integrate these records with geo-referenced cadastral maps and dedicate the same to the public for their ease of use. He further emphasized the need for the Department to constitute teams of revenue experts who would visit districts to gauge the accuracy of these digitised records. It is pivotal to check the quality and accuracy of these records, and people themselves should take the lead in scrutinising their respective records for any discrepancies so that these can be rectified in a timely manner.
During this meeting, Dulloo also took note of the online services provisioned by the Department to the public. He enjoined the officers to act tough against those violating the Public Service Guarantee Act (PSGA) timelines set for different services. He insisted on putting a check on last-minute reverting or cancellation of applications, maintaining that it defeats the purpose of this act.
However, the Financial Commissioner (Revenue) stated that the Department has made substantial progress in the digitisation process, with most of it completed by field officials, except in Jammu and Srinagar districts. He revealed that the Department is currently engaged in the verification process to ensure the quality and accuracy of these records. This exercise is expected to be completed within a month’s time to enable the Department to move towards integrating it with vectorised cadastral maps.
The Secretary of Revenue provided insights about the achievements of the Department in this direction, along with steps to be taken under the land records modernisation programme. He mentioned that the objective of this programme is to develop a modern, comprehensive, and transparent land records management system. He also apprised the meeting about the progress made so far and the future steps to be taken from here.
It was added that after digitisation, the Department is working on digitising cadastral maps followed by their geo-referencing, which has been completed up to 89 percent across villages. The meeting was also informed that the integration of spatial (geo-referenced) maps with digitised Records of Rights (RoRs) is the next step in the line of action, culminating in making it live on the LRIS portal for use and to ease access for the general public.