Coordinated Action Imperative to Resolve Land-Related Grievances, Says TDP State President Palla Srinivasa Rao* - Petitions Committee Meeting Held at Visakhapatnam Collectorate

.                   by. Sharma K.V.  Editor
Visakhapatnam, November 21:*At a meeting of the Petitions Committee on the Comprehensive Land Survey held at the Visakhapatnam Collectorate under the chairmanship of *Deputy Speaker Raghu Rama Krishna Raju, TDP State President and Gajuwaka MLA Palla Srinivasa Rao* urged the administration to respond with urgency and sensitivity to the land-related hardships that citizens have been enduring for months. He stressed that departments must work in close coordination, rather than operating in silos, to restore confidence in the system.

Speaking at the review, Mr. Srinivasa Rao drew attention to an unsettling trend within the Public Grievance Redressal System (PGRS): of the 12 lakh complaints received in the past 18 months, nearly 7 lakh pertained to revenue and land matters. This, he noted, was a “stark indicator” of deep-rooted structural deficiencies in land administration.

He pointed out recurring irregularities—incorrect survey numbers, wrongful or missing name entries in official records, the failure to update registration records after lands were cleared from Section 22(A), technical discrepancies in Webland data, changes in survey numbers during the re-survey process, and prolonged delays in issuing passbooks. These issues, he said, were fuelling “widespread dissatisfaction and confusion among the people.”

Emphasising the need for seamless departmental integration, the MLA underscored the urgency of establishing an automatic data-synchronisation system across the Registration, Revenue, and Survey departments. He called for expedited field verification at the village level, a systematic review of legacy records, and timely issuance of pattadar passbooks, asserting that these measures must be treated as top priority by the administration.

Turning to the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (VSP), Mr. Srinivasa Rao highlighted that recent breakthroughs were possible only due to Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s “far-sighted and decisive” leadership. He cited the Ministry of Heavy Industries’ crucial decision to convert ₹2,400 crore in power dues into share capital, the ₹14,000-crore revival package jointly approved by the Centre and the State, the deposit of ₹9,500 crore into RINL accounts, and the restoration of the third blast furnace.

He rebutted the narrative that the plant cannot function without captive mines, calling it “a politically motivated falsehood.” YSRCP and CITU leaders, he alleged, “choose not to see facts—only the falsehoods that serve their political ends.”

The MLA added that he had appealed to the Union Ministry of Steel and Heavy Industries to restore the Grant-in-Aid provided to Vimal Vidyalaya within the steel plant’s jurisdiction. The Union Minister, he said, responded promptly, assuring that the government had no objection to the proposal and that formal approval would be granted once the VSP management issued its final consent.

The meeting was attended by MLAs Vishnu Kumar Raju and Konathala Ramakrishna, the APLA Secretary, senior IAS officials, and members of the Revenue Department.