The residents of PehliporaYarwan area of north Kashmir’s Baramulla district Tuesday appealed the government to conduct an inquiry into the compensation granted “illegally to fake land owners”.
Talking to Greater Kashmir, a resident of Pehlipora, Muhammad Maqbool Mir said, “This is complete injustice with the landowners as we were not paid a single penny for the land acquisition for the construction of road under PMGSY. Fake names were included by the local authorities of the village. There wasn’t a single apple or walnut tree in our area but the illegal entries were granted compensation for it.”
He said that they had been cheated by the Panchayat representatives by mentioning the names of their own family members in the list of land owners.
“This is the biggest scam that a person who does not own a single piece of land in the area has been given compensation along with his family members while the Vigilance department is sitting quietly,” said a local. “We were solely dependent on our land for our livelihood. Large tracts of our land were acquired for the construction of the road but after this negligence, we had to knock at the door of the Vigilance department and Revenue department to listen to our plea.”
A resident of PehliporaYarwan said, “The Revenue and Vigilance department deputed an inquiry officer but were asking locals to provide more than 30 years old records. Even after an inquiry, the departments refuted our accusations.”
The locals appealed the Lieutenant Governor ManojSinha to intervene and conduct a probe into the matter.
“We also urge the LG to put all those officials behind the bars who are hand-in-glove with the fraudsters,” the locals said.
Meanwhile, Additional Deputy Commissioner Baramulla Muhammad Ahsan Mir said that the verification of the case was pending due to pandemic and harsh weather conditions.
“We will soon reopen the case and after clarification, the reports will be sent to the concerned official. We will monitor that the deserved get benefitted,” he said.