Tamil Nadu government plans special drive to update land records

The communication regarding the special drive for updating land records has been sent to respective departments

The Commissionerate of Land Administration has instructed local body authorities across Tamil Nadu to conduct a special drive for necessary updation of the land records (with subdivisions) and mark out the Open Space Reservation (OSR) lands in Municipal Corporations, Municipalities, Town Panchayats and Village Panchayats, as many of OSR lands remain untraceable.

In a recent communication, the Commissioner of Land Administration (CLA) S. Nagarajan requested authorities to give special attention and review the issue weekly and send progress report.

Also read: Chennai Corporation plans special drive to mark out OSR land, update records

The CLA’s move followed an observation from the Director of Municipal Administration who said many of the OSR lands remain untraceable. As per Rule 47(6) of Tamil Nadu Combined Development and Building Rules, the name of any gifted land/open spaces land has to be changed in favour of the local body concerned.

However, the Directorate of Municipal Administration observed that in many cases, the reserved lands still remain in the name of private owner/s,and many of the owners of the layout are not traceable.

In a communication to the Commissionerate of Land Administration, the Directorate of Municipal Administration said: “The local bodies name is not reflected in the land records. The urban local bodies are facing problems in maintaining the gifted land and are not able to legally guard the lands from litigations and encroachments.”

According to provisional figures available with the government, there are over 1,000 OSR sites in urban local bodies within the jurisdiction of 20 Municipal Corporations. In Erode Municipal Corporation, there are 328 OSR sites of which, 130 have more than 300 sqm, while 198 have less than 300 sqm.