BJP national president JP Nadda on Sunday, 25 June, said the Dharani portal — a one-stop destination for carrying out agricultural land registrations in Telangana — would be abolished if the BJP was voted to power in the next Assembly elections in the state.
Addressing the BJP’s Nava Sankalp public meeting organised by the state unit in the Nagarkunool district of Telangana, he said the portal was filling the pockets of the BRS leaders.
The BRS government had harassed farmers by using the BRS portal, he alleged; it had benefited only BRS leaders.
Nadda said that under the pretext of Pharma City, the government had forcibly acquired farmers’ land.
Nadda’s statement on scrapping the Dharani portal appeared to be at odds on what party state president Bandi Sanjay Kumar said: That it would be continued after rectifying its shortcomings.
Describing the BRS as “Bhrashtachar Rakshasula Samithi”, he got a negative reply from the people who came to attend the public meeting when he asked whether they supported corruption.
The Dharani e-governance revenue portal was once seen as a revolutionary step as it digitalised Telangana’s land administration assuring transparency.The current consensus is that it has now turned into a nightmare for lakhs of citizens.
However, the BRS government in Telangana has not taken kindly to criticism of this initiative.Earlier this month, Telangana Chief Minister and BRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao said at a public meeting in the Adilabad district that those criticising the Dharani portal must be dumped in the Bay of Bengal.
Incidentally, Union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy on 12 May said land disputes in Telangana had increased manifold after the commencement of the Dharani portal.
Given the progression of the tussle over the portal, it would not be surprising to see Dharani becoming a political issue in the upcoming Telangana Assembly electiions.
