Sambalpur: Fraudulent sale of lands belonging to tribals, the poor, and the gullible are on the rise in Sambalpur district. It has been alleged that middlemen and agents are manipulating records and selling the land without the knowledge of the original owners.
Sources said Monday that despite repeated complaints, preventive measures have not been put in place to stop the fraudulent sale of plots of land. This has only emboldened the middlemen and agents to carry on with their illegal deals with impunity.
The sources pointed out that such deals could not happen without the connivance of revenue and tehsil officials. The matter came to the fore after a middleman allegedly manipulated records and sold off four acres 53 decimal of land belonging to Prafulla Rana, a native of Jarasingha mouza under Kayakud panchayat in Jujumura tehsil. A document to this effect has also been prepared and the said land has been registered under the name of Jagadish Panda. The document prepared on a stamp paper worth Rs 25,000 is dated November 22, 2022. Prafulla’s photo has been replaced with a photograph of Panda, who has bought the land. Karuna Rana and Mansoor Ali Khan have signed the sale document as witnesses. Prafulla came to know about the fraudulent deal when he visited the local mandi to sell harvested paddy. He then lodged a complaint at the Jujumura police station following which the cops started an investigation into the matter.
A complaint has also been filed with the district collector’s office and efforts are on to nullify the deal. All the papers submitted for the sale of land were found fake after the sub-registrar office conducted verification. On the other hand, the tehsil office at Jujumura has submitted a report to the sub-registrar’s office. Police have also asked the tehsil office to submit copies of all the documents. After reports of the clandestine deal surfaced, Panda allegedly transferred back the land in the name of Prafulla, June 2. This development again proves the alleged nexus between Panda and the middleman with officials. Efforts by the police to nab the accused have failed till now.
Sources said that minute details have to be worked out for selling land. Scrutiny of the land is done by the sub-registrar’s office. The land is registered in the name of the new owner only after verification of the identity of the seller and his consent. In this case, there is ample proof that the due process has not been followed. The sources pointed out the involvement of tehsil officials in the deal. They said without inside help, Prafulla’s name couldn’t have been struck off. When contacted, Jujumura IIC Rajkumar Biswal said a case has been registered. He confirmed that Panda has again registered back the land in the name of Prafulla. Biswal said that a probe has unraveled the involvement of a middleman in the fraud and efforts are on to arrest all the accused.