KATHMANDU, May 9: The Ministry of Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation has begun investigation on the involvement of government employees in the encroachment upon public lands. The Ministry took the initiative in the wake of the media reports relating to the Baluwatar land scam.
The Ministry banned the transaction of some 485 kittas of land in Baluwatar and the vicinity and began probe on the involvement of land mafia and government employees on illegal dealing of the public lands. The issues as surveying and registration of public lands under personal names, using land as bribe to evade legal obligations are under investigation at the Ministry.
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Secretary at the Ministry, Gopinath Mainali, informed that they were studying how the government lands were registered under personal ownership and what kind of mistakes or involvement the government staffs had on it. As the study was going on, it would not be wise to disclose everything. Untimely disclosure of facts may affect investigation, so it would be made public after the completion of the investigation, he added.
After this study, the Ministry would conduct further investigation on how the government lands were misused and encroached.
It is learnt that in collusion with the staffs at the offices of survey, land revenue, the land mafia had changed the names and addresses of real land owners and numbers in the field books.
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