Bengaluru, 12 June

Karnataka Revenue Department has launched a new mobile application to tackle the persistent issue of government land encroachment. This app boasts a comprehensive digital database of over 1.4 million government land parcels across the state.

"This app offers a systematic and reliable solution to identify land encroachment," said Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda. The app provides detailed digital records, including survey numbers, land extents, and geo-boundaries, for every government landholding in every village. This transparency aims to deter potential encroachers.

The app leverages GPS technology to map each property. Officials have physically visited nearly 600,000 of these sites to verify their status. This initiative comes after a legislative bill proposing land record digitization was introduced in December 2023. The plan involves drone surveys and indexing of revenue records to further strengthen land protection measures.

This app replaces the older Bhoomi app, which digitised land records from manual formats in the early 2000s. The new app, along with ongoing field verification by village administrative officers (VAOs), establishes a robust system for safeguarding government land.

Beyond preventing encroachment, the app offers additional functionalities. Users can identify buffer zones, areas with building restrictions, similar to those viewable on revenue maps within Google Maps. A timelapse feature allows users to observe historical land-use changes within a specified area. This can be helpful in understanding buffer zones and regulations for future constructions. -Salar News