The Kerala Maritime Board has formed a land management unit to survey and protect the land of 17 non-major ports under the Maritime Board. The unit is being established with the aim of protecting the land owned by the Board under the provisions of the Indian Ports Act, 1908 and the Kerala Maritime Board Act of 2017, said a recent statement issued by the office of Ports Minister Ahammad Devarkovil.
A committee has been formed for this purpose with retired Deputy Collector V.K. Balan as its head and retired Survey Deputy Superintendent Chandrabhanu and retired tahsildar K. Ravindran as members. Headquartered at the Port Conservator’s Office, Kozhikode, the committee will soon submit a report to the department after surveying the land of the non-major ports.
Based on the report, the department will evict all the illegal encroachments and constructions on the Board’s land. Also, projects started on the land owned by the Board without any legal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) will be evicted once this report is available.
Further, the department will make available the land and buildings owned by the Maritime Board in the State to the investors to promote entrepreneurship through public-private-partnership. The formation of the land management unit is the first step in this direction, said Mr. Devarkovil
