Squatters on the Musi river bed are all set to get compensation before they are evicted. Several families who constructed houses on the river bed, have legitimate ‘pattas’ issued to their forefathers by the Nizams, the erstwhile rulers of Hyderabad state. These pattas were given to them for grass cultivation. Though constructing houses in the river bed area is in violation of the present rules, the state government cannot evict the occupants without paying compensation.
Though over 5,000 encroachments dot the river bed, compensation is likely to be paid to only the families holding legitimate pattas. Others will be evicted without any compensation but would be rehabilitated in the housing colonies being constructed by the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation with JNNURM funds. As much as 57,721 square yards of land in the river bed under encroachment is government land and another 68,924 square yards of land that has houses has been identified as patta land.
The government has so far spent Rs 1,000 crore on mitigating pollution in the river Musi, but to be an open drain. Even the encroachment on the river bed by land sharks continues. The modus operandi is to systematically fill up the river bed with debris, particularly the stretch near Chaderghat bridge, and the land in the river bed is then sold to the gullible for Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000 per square yard.
A senior official said eviction would start in three months’ time once the maximum flood flow level of the Musi was demarcated. “The CIST Infrastructure Limited has completed the Musi river basin study and has given the required technical inputs for determination of the Maximum Flood Flow Level (MFFL). The experts five-member committee, appointed by government, will review the report submitted by CIST, consider the historical data on surplus from Osmansagar and Himayatsagar and indicate the Musi MFFL. Once this is done, all encroachments in Musi will be bulldozed. The committee has been given three months’ time to finalise the MFFL,” the official said.
Though the officials claimed that encroachments were removed from 29,342 square yards of the total 57,721 square yards of government land, sources said the encroachments have slowly resurfaced.