22-A “lapses”, no culprits
Private owners got blocked, ministers admit “lapses”, promise fixes. Collusion? Commissions? The Congress govt says none. Telangana can count the complaints — 757 of them — faster than it can get a straight answer.
The state has promised corrections; the question of responsibility remains locked.
Harish Rao says the 22-A mess wasn’t an accident — he alleges “commissions and settlements”, cites Budvel survey numbers vanishing overnight and colonies yo-yoing on and off the list. Those are his charges; he’s asked why CM A. Revanth Reddy hasn’t called in the CID yet. (A report of the BRS meet records the claims and the party setting up a 10-advocate legal cell to help owners.)
What the Congress government in Telangana has put on the record is simpler: Revenue Minister Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy has admitted “administrative lapses” that wrongly trapped private owners after revised lists were uploaded post a High Court direction. He blames mismatched records and old ULC baggage, says 757 complaints came in across four districts, and promises relief in days. He also insists “not a single square yard” of private land was newly added by this government. The Chief Minister tells rights-holders “need not worry” and talks of splitting survey numbers to set things right.
Here’s the part that isn’t a debate: the state’s own Bhu Bharati portal runs a prohibited-lands search and lays out a correction route when only part of a survey number was acquired — split the number, restore the pattadar’s balance in the passbook, move on. The CCLA chairs the grievance committee for 22-A(1)(e) cases. The machinery to fix errors exists; the errors did too, by the minister’s admission.
So yes, genuine owners were blocked. Yes, the Congress ministers now promise to un-block them. And on the uncomfortable bit — who put what there and why — the Congress side prefers assurances over answers. Telangana will take the corrections; it still deserves the explanation the Congress isn’t giving.