Hyderabad: The spectre of the ghastly killing of a female tehsildar in her official chambers earlier this month in Telangana continues to loom over the rank and file of the revenue departments in the two Telugu states.
A farmer, enraged by the “arbitrary” decision of the revenue authorities in settling disputes over his farmland in favour of a realtor, doused Abdullapurmet tehsildar Vijaya Reddy with petrol and set her ablaze. In the aftermath, the Telangana Deputy Collectors Association urged tehsildars across the state to come to their offices with pepper sprays as a precautionary measure against a possible repeat of the Abdullapurmet incident. The farmer and the tehsildar’s driver have also succumbed to injuries they sustained in the incident.
Two days after the deadly attack, Kurnool’s Pattikonda tehsildar Umamaheswari in the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh state developed a makeshift “enclosure” with ropes around her official seat, keeping petitioners visiting her at a “safe distance”.
The weekly grievance redressal programme at the Khammam collectorate was conducted under the shadow of a large contingent of armed police who did not let people enter the collector’s chambers without frisking them for containers of inflammable liquids like petrol and kerosene.
Since the death of Vijaya Reddy, instances of revenue officials receiving threat calls have apparently risen in the two states.
Even as the tehsildar’s killing triggered massive protests from fellow revenue officers with demands for stern action against those behind the incident, the accused, astonishingly, was posthumously hailed by other farmers. Messages on social media platforms depicted the accused farmer as “Bharateeyudu 2”, a reference to the 1996 movie in which Kamal Haasan plays a vigilante who kills corrupt officials.
Jakkireddy Mutyam Reddy, a farmer from Gurramgudem under the Balapur mandal, reached out to family members of Suresh, the farmer, and gave them Rs 10,000 in cash.
Mutyam Reddy said when he purchased a piece of agricultural land in Abdulpurmet and approached the revenue personnel at Abdulpurmet for effecting a mutation (change of land ownership from seller to buyer) in Pahani, he was allegedly asked to pay Rs 1 lakh by the village revenue officer (VRO) for doing the “favour”. Mutyam Reddy reportedly got the VRO trapped by the Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB). Vijaya Reddy was also alleged to have received a notice from the ACB.
Relatives of P. Vijaya Reddy at her residence, in Hyderabad. Photo: PTI
An offshoot of public anger
In the recent past, at least 20 distressed farmers allegedly took their own lives. But their deaths did not get the public attention that the killing of Vijaya Reddy received, commented senior journalist S.K. Jakeer. The murder of the tehsildar appears to be a convergence of public anger over the revenue department allegedly being steeped in corruption, red tape and irregularities in land records.
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A senior official working with the Telangana’s ACB told The Wire that one in every four graft cases the agency lays its hands on is from the revenue department. Telangana chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao himself went on record at a collectors’ conference saying revenue, municipal administration and panchayat raj departments have earned notoriety for corruption. The CM called for radical changes in the departments, including the abolition of the VRO system and merging the revenue department with the panchayat raj wing.
The remarks were obviously strongly rebutted by the Telangana revenue employees associations. G. Upendra of the Telangana Village Revenue Officers Association sought to link the attacks on the revenue officers with the chief minister’s comments targeting revenue officers.
A spoiler for Rythu Bandhu?
KCR’s flagship scheme, Rythu Bandhu, supports farmers by providing investment costs. The government had touted it as a remedy for farmer suicides. Telangana records among the highest number of farmer suicides. Under the scheme, 60 lakh farmers are eligible to receive financial assistance of Rs 10,000 per acre for each year on presenting their pattadar passbooks before the authorities concerned. The data released by a non-profit peasant organisation, Rythu Swarajya Vedia (RSV), revealed over 3,000 farmers killed themselves due to distress since the formation of the Telangana state in 2014 to 2017.
The Rythu Bandhu scheme turned out to be a major vote catcher for the TRS, which came to power with a resounding victory over the Congress-TDP grand alliance.
But the inability of farmers to receive pattadar passbooks from the revenue department for different reasons has become a hurdle. While 60 lakh farmers are entitled to receiving the benefits, nearly 10 lakh have apparently not received pattadar passbooks.
Sarampalli Malla Reddy of the Telangana Rythu Sangham says the distribution of pattadar passbooks breeds corruption in the revenue department and unrest in farmers as they will not receive cash assistance without passbooks. Reddy said some farmers have been making rounds to the revenue offices for the past 20-30 years for their passbooks to reflect the transfer of land rights.
Telangana chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao. Photo: Facebook/KCR
Malla Reddy sought to pick holes in KCR’s claim that he is a farmer-friendly leader. He accused the TRS government of doing injustice to tenant farmers. He criticised the government’s exclusion of tenant farmers who have been cultivating for several decades from the Rythu Bandhu scheme, limiting it only to landlords.
It is alleged that the revenue department’s functions such as issuing survey reports and certificates that permit the conversion of agricultural land for non-agricultural purposes breeds corruption. Inordinate delays in settlement of land disputes in revenue courts and government’s failure to update pahanis (adangals) and land records caused unrest in the farming community.
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Revenue personnel are charged with demanding bribes from farmers for transferring rights over lands to legal heirs. A section of VROs allegedly create fake sale deeds. In Telangana, land transactions of farmers have been transferred orally over the years. Now, these farmers require the revenue authorities to mention the transactions in the passbook, so as to receive the benefit under the Rythu Bandhu scheme.
L. Lachchi Reddy of the Telangana Deputy Collectors Association said it is unfair to put the entire blame only on the revenue department for all the maladies that afflicted the revenue system. He said a land survey was done in the 1940s and there have not beeen any efforts made to conduct another survey. Disputes within family members, along with legal disputes pending trial in courts are also reasons for a delay in the distribution of pattadar passbooks, he contended.
