CPI (M) seeks pattas for people living on government lands

CPI (M) will organise a protest in front of the new Secretariat if the government fails to issue pattas to people living on government lands for years together, warned CPIM State secretary G. Ramakrishnan on Monday.

Addressing a protest fast in support of the demand for pattas here, Mr. Ramakrishnan said lakhs of people living on temple, government and poromboke lands in Chennai and suburban areas and other parts of the State were facing the threat of eviction with the government treating them as encroachers.

Though the government had issued an order for issuing patta if a person was living in a place for more than three years, the condition that pattas should be issued only if the government did not require the land remained a stumbling block.

Recalling his meeting with Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi and the request for issuing pattas for those who had been living on temple lands on the lines of a decision taken by the E.M.S. Namboothiripad government in Kerala, Mr. Ramakrishnan said the money from the sale of land was deposited in banks and utilised for the maintenance of temples.

“The Chief Minister agreed to constitute a committee to study the Kerala model. We want to remind him about it,” he said.

Former State secretary of the party N. Varadarajan said only the poor who had migrated from villages.

(Courtesy : The Hindu)