PANAJI
It would be a year in January 2025 since the Cabinet approved recommendation s of the Commission of Inquiry into land grabbing cases, but recommendations to curb the menace including appointing a Special Court remain unimplemented.
Retired Justice V K Jadhav-led Commission’s report proposed the State government to appoint a Special Court with a designated public prosecutor to expedite cases of land grabbing. The Court would have sweeping powers to determine civil and criminal liabilities, bind judgments on all parties and restore land to rightful owners.
“State government must appoint a Special Court a public prosecutor... The Special Court is empowered to determine the order in which the civil and criminal liability against the land grabber to be initiated. It is the discretion of the Special Court whether or not to deliver its decision or order until both civil and criminal proceedings are completed,” reads an extract of the recommendations from the report, copy of which is in possession of The Goan.
While the Commission insisted these cases be disposed within six months, recommendations also included enacting a comprehensive law, tentatively titled “The Goa Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act, 2023,” which would criminalize land grabbing, nullify illegal transactions and provide a robust legal framework for the prevention and prosecution of such offenses.
“Any transaction relating to an alienation of a land grabbed or any part thereof by way of sale, lease, gift, exchange, settlement, surrender, usufructuary mortgage or otherwise or any partition effected or a trust created in respect of such land, which has taken place whether before or after the commencement of this Act shall, except to the extent ordered by the Special Court be null and void,” it stated.
However, despite the Cabinet’s nod to these recommendations, its implementation is awaited. In June, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant announced introducing amendments to existing laws and enacting new legislation during the monsoon session in line with the recommendations of the one-man commission.
Meanwhile, the Commission has also recommended installing CCTVs all across the Department of Archives & Archaeology Department after revelations that original documents were stolen/manipulated by the accused.
