PANAJI
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is evidently banking on the Pramod Sawant government's 'Majhe Ghar' scheme linked to the recent controversial laws it passed to regularise illegal houses on government land, comunidade land and others to earn it electoral pelf at the upcoming Zilla Panchayat polls and subsequently at the 2027 assembly elections.
On Wednesday, the scheme had a 'soft-launch' on the occasion of the birthday of Prime Minister Narendra Modi where Sawant said the scheme is expected to benefit nearly 50 per cent of the State's population.
The chief minister said, notifications giving the laws effect have already been issued and once all the legal formalities and technicalities are completed, the scheme will be formally launched with application forms to seek benefit being made available simultaneously.
"It will be done at the hands of Union Home Minister Amit Shah," Sawant said, indicating that the saffron party is heavily placing its bets on this scheme to earn it public goodwill and electoral gain from it.
The government has also moved a process to transfer apartment-flats allotted to beneficiaries under rehabilitation programmes in the past officially in the name of current occupants, Sawant added.
The legislations which the government pushed through in the July-August monsoon session included an amendment to the Goa Land Revenue Code, 1968 and another which amended the Code of Comunidades.
The amendment to the Land Revenue Code added a provision which gives powers to the Deputy Collectors to grant 'Class I' Occupancy for plots (up to 300 sq mts) on which illegal houses are built on government land to the occupants of these houses.
The Code of Comunidades amendment also inserted a similar provision by which a Grade I officer to be designated by the government is empowered to grant similar ownership of up to 300 sq mts for illegal houses/ encrochments built on comunidade lands.
