The Forest and Revenue departments are locking horns over the nature and allocation of 9.904 hectares at Chethalayam for landless families in Wayanad.
The February 17 order of the Revenue department allocating the land to 19 Scheduled Caste members has caught Forest department off guard as it turned down the department’s claim that the holding was forest land.
The Revenue department held that the holding was not marked as forest land in the Basic Tax Register, Re-Survey and Re-Settlement Register, and the Survey and Settlement Register. It was marked as Forest Palayam Land in revenue records, which cannot be considered as forest land. Moreover, it was also recorded as revenue land in Revenue records, according to the order.
