Bellary: The Karnataka government, which had said in the Belagavi Legislature session in December 2023 that it would appoint an expert committee to review the survey conducted to demarcate the inter-state border between Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, has not yet come forward to form the committee.
As a result, the preparation of an accurate official map of the inter-state border is likely to be further delayed. On the other hand, the work of joint survey and mapping of B1 category mines in the border area also seems to have stalled.
The border between Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh has been destroyed as a result of illegal mining.
According to the Supreme Court order, the Survey of India completed the demarcation work between the two states in 2021 and prepared the map. However, Karnataka has objected to this survey.
It has been alleged that there are technical errors in this survey and it has been prepared unilaterally without taking the opinion of the officials of Karnataka.
The then Bellary district collector had written a letter to Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in this regard in 2022.
Karnataka also objected to the methodology followed for the survey. Not only this, the chief secretary to the government did not even sign the boundary survey report submitted to the Supreme Court on behalf of Karnataka. Thus the survey report was incomplete.
Bellary city MLA Nara Bharat Reddy brought these issues to the attention of the government during the Belgavi session held in December last year.
He demanded that the state land should be protected. Responding to this, Revenue minister Krishna Byre Gowda said, ‘Survey of India has conducted a survey to mark the border of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Objections to this have come to my notice. He promised in the House that an expert committee would be appointed to review the survey. However, the committee has not yet been formed.
MLA Nara Bharat Reddy had also asked in the recent legislative session that a committee be appointed to review the boundary survey. Minister Krishna Byregowda who has replied to this himself, has given an official written reply that ‘the committee of experts has not been formed yet’.
Speaking to Siasat.com, Tapal Ganesh a social worker of Bellary said that Karnataka’s position is that the survey should be based on the 1896 map. This was proposed in the CEC meeting held recently. The survey of mines on the border before the demarcation process which was completed is wasteful.
“The errors in the survey conducted by the Survey of India were brought to the notice of the Revenue Minister. He promised to appoint a high-level committee of experts,” Bharat Reddy MLA Bellary Nagar told Siasat.com.
The inter-state border is crossed at the ‘tri-junction’ point where H Siddapur and Malapanahudi of Ananthapuram district and Tumati Vitalapura of Bellary district would meet. The Supreme Court issued an order on September 28, 2022, to conduct a joint survey and prepare maps of seven mines within Karnataka along the border.
It clearly stated that the joint team should finalize the work within three months after the completion of the landmark work. Meanwhile, the Central Empowered Commission (CEC) held a meeting in Bangalore on March 6.
The meeting discussed the necessary steps to be taken for the joint survey, the drone survey and the deployment of officers for the survey.
How can the survey of mines on the border be done without the process of demarcation being completed? On what basis will the survey be conducted? ‘There is still commotion, the government should appoint a committee at the earliest.
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