Days after Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren against warning corrupt practices in offices dealing with land records, state land revenue minister Dipak Birua threatened action against circle officers for rejecting applications of land holders on flimsy grounds.

Dipak Birua while reviewing a meeting of the land revenue and land reforms department in Ranchi said that action will be initiated against circle officers (each block in the state has a designated circle officer who is responsible for land revenue related work) who rejects applications of raiyats (original land holders) citing “technical reasons”.

“It is mandatory for the circle officers to give clear cut reasons written within 50 for rejecting the applications or objections raised on matters related to mutations in the blocks,” said Dipak Birua.

According to sources in the department there have been complaints of officials including circle officers seeking bribes for land related works by delaying or rejecting the land papers on frivolous grounds on several occasions.

Earlier, Hemant Soren had said in Dhanbad on February 3 that there is a lot of corruption in the circle office. He had also warned that the government will take strict action against the circle officer who commits irregularities.

Dipak Birua further said that several times the circle officers make excuses to reject the applications by simply writing that the Jharbhoomi portal is not opening due to technical reasons.

“Now this will not work. There are many irregularities in the circle offices pertaining to land related issues. The government has to bear the payment for it. Therefore, all the circle officers should discharge their duties honestly and diligently,” said Birua.

The minister also raised the issue of poor printing quality of the khatian (land record) forms from the modern record rooms at the circle offices.

“Many times the printing of khatian from modern record rooms is not correct. The photocopy of khatian is not visible. Such discrepancies should be corrected. Due to lack of clear scanning, the land holders do notget the correct information about their land and face problems even after taking out the khatian,” the ministerpointed out.