The Kerala High Court on Thursday observed that the State government is bound to honour an agreement, signed in 2010, to provide land to landless tribal, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe families at Chengara in Pathanamthitta.
Justice Devan Ramachandran made the observation while hearing a writ petition filed in 2013 by the Adivasi Dalit Munneta Samithi relating to the land allotment agreement.
The court said that the claims of the Adivasis and SC/ST families remained unresolved either because they had not been given the land promised or because the land offered to them was unsuitable for living. Nothing was placed on record by the government as to how the claims of the 1,495 families had been dealt with. The issues remained without a complete solution for the last two decades and if such status was allowed to continue ad infinitum, “the unrest of the past may hold up its head again and escalate in future.”
‘Uninhabitable’
The agreement was signed in 2010 between the organisation representing the landless tribespeople in Chengara and the State government, following agitations for land. Land was promised to deserving landless families. According to the petitioner, the land allocated were unsuitable and uninhabitable.
‘Identify beneficiaries’
The court also directed the State government to identify the deserving families on the basis of a report of the Land Revenue Commissioner submitted in 2009. The court directed the State government to furnish the list of the families who were given land, if any, as per the agreement.
The court also asked the State government to furnish the list of families allotted uninhabitable land.
