E- governance is the new bandwagon in Karnataka and Rajeev Chawla, Secretary, e-governance, its brand name. Chawla is the person behind the implementation of Bhumi, a computerised system for maintaining land records. He is a recipient of the Prime Minister’s award for excellence in public administration.
The Bhumi programme began in 2000 as a pilot project in five talukas. It was later extended to all the 177 talukas of the state – covering about 6.7 million farmers owning 20 million land holdings! It was a Himalayan challenge that Chawla, then Additional Secretary in the Revenue Department (Land Reform) of the state, accepted.
He worked with 10,000 village accountants and over 2, 000 revenue officials for four years to digitize 20 million manual land records – an achievement unmatched in any other state.
The manual system of keeping land records involved over 9,000 village accountants and was beset with manipulation, delay and exploitation of farmers. Bhumi has made it possible for a farmer to obtain a copy of the Record of Right Tenancy and Cultivation (RTC) free. An additional copy costing Rs 15 is available at village kiosks.
Chawla’s work included planning, training of officials at taluka level, garnering political support, and tackling misgivings and pessimism among the rural people. The project was unique in that, regardless of which party came to power in the state, it remained an apolitical developmental project.
Training of government officials cost Rs 12.8 million but the investment has fructified. The project has recovered Rs 180 million in three years against the total investment of Rs 244 million. The time taken to generate a copy of the RTC has been reduced from 1-30 days to 5-15 minutes. Crop record updating has increased to 80-100 per cent from 50-70 per cent. Records show charges have been collected from about 200 million users and the government expects to collect a minimum revenue of Rs 10 crore annually.
