26.69 Ha of Agriculture College land in city under encroachment
   Date :21-Aug-2020

Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi
 
 
 
Staff Reporter :
 
Agriculture College-Nagpur run by Dr Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth (PDKV) has land in prime locations in Nagpur city. However, of 422.72 hectares of the college land, 26.69 hectares is under encroachment, the college revealed in response to a query filed under Right to Information (RTI) Act by city-based activist Abhay Kolarkar. Kolarkar sought to know the land with Agriculture College, Nagpur, how much was under encroachment, details of litigations involving the land, land with PDKV in Ramdaspeth area and how much of it was under encroachment etc.
 
Accordingly, Associate Dean and Public Information Officer of Agriculture College, Nagpur, provided the information. As per the information, there is encroachment on land with Agriculture College as well as PDKV. As far as encroachments on Agriculture College land are concerned, several of these date back to the period when PDKV was yet to be established. PDKV was established on October 20, 1969, with its headquarters at Akola and sub-campus at Nagpur with constituent college -- Agriculture College. Agriculture College, in its reply to Kolarkar, has named District Collector, Nagpur and others (Variety Talkies lease case) as ‘encroacher’ of 0.62 hectares of land. It has named 11 persons of Kachi community in the list of encroachers, stating that the litigation started in this regard in 1976.
 
In some other cases, court proceedings are going on since 1982, 1984, 1985, 1989, and 2000. As much as 2.43 hectares of total land under encroachment, is under slum. Agriculture College has not got possession of land in any of these cases in court, reveals response to RTI query. As per the response to Kolarkar’s RTI application, PDKV has 111.32 hectares of land in Mouza Lendhra, 9.03 hectares in Mouza Sitabuldi, and 31.70 hectares of land in Mouza Gadga. Of this total 152.05 hectares of land of PDKV in Nagpur city, 19.26 hectares is under encroachment.
 
Thirteen encroachers have been named in the list provided by Agriculture College to Kolarkar. Taking cognisance of the encroachments on PDKV’s land in Ramdaspeth, the court had asked Additional Collector to conduct ‘spot inspection’ in 2009-10. As per the Agriculture College, the Additional Collector had submitted the report of spot inspection to the court. But, what happened later on has not been mentioned in the reply to RTI query. Also, the college has informed the applicant that it was taking action ‘as per the law and in accordance with the court orders’.
 
Also, when asked about the revenue that PDKV or the Government was deprived of because of encroachments on the land, the college has stated that the college or PDKV is ‘not receiving any kind of revenue from the unauthorised shop-owners on the said lands’. Further, the college has replied that the Government schedule of rates of land is ‘not available’ with the office of the Associate Dean of Agriculture College, when the applicant asked about the valuation of the land under encroachment as per the Government schedule of rates.