Three acre land for poor Dalits

Hyderabad: The much touted TRS government’s free land distribution scheme for Dalits will prioritise the poorest landless Dalits, who will get three acres first, along with a development package.

About three lakh Dalit families of a total of 11.92 lakh (15.44 per cent of the state’s population) will get three acre of land and development schemes tagged to it, in the first phase, it is reliably learnt.

Sources told this newspaper that Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao was keen on according top priority to landless Dalits first, followed by other Dalits under the scheme.

“Our first priority will be landless Dalits followed by other better off Dalits. Most landless Dalits are agricultural labourers, bonded labour and lead an awfully poor life. It is the desire of the CM to help them first. A survey is already on to identify beneficiaries,” a senior official said.

According to government plans, Dalits in rural areas alone would get the land and not in urban and semi-urban areas, where land is costly. The government intends to spend Rs 5 lakh to Rs 15 lakh per beneficiary under the scheme, which is the second major scheme to be floated from August 15 after the announcement of the Rs 1 lakh loan waiver scheme.

While a landless poor Dalit will get three acre of land in one place, other SC beneficiaries having small plots of land of half, one and two acre and others shall be provided with the balance to make them land owners for three acre each, in the following phases.

The scheme, including development of the land, will be applicable to all lands purchased under the scheme in the past and in the future. It will include all lands, which are under the possession and cultivation of the Scheduled Caste beneficiaries, including assigned lands, government land assigned, surplus lands assigned, all lands inherited by the Scheduled Castes beneficiaries among others.

Of the Dalit households accounting for 11.92 lakh in the state, 9.2 lakh reside in rural areas, and the rest in semi-urban and urban areas. Of them, landless Dalit number about three lakh.

Besides registering the land in the name of women of the SC household, the government will bear the entire cost of registration fee, stamp duty and other incidental expenses.

A comprehensive package has also been envisaged for development of the land, including irrigation facilities, drip facilities, seed, cost of cultivation, fertilisers, pesticides, ploughing, micro irrigation, energisation, pump sets among others for one crop year.

This is in addition to providing funds for land development, preparation of nursery and agricultural inputs. The amounts for meeting the cost of cultivation etc shall be directly transferred into the beneficiary’s account.