The Indian Army has raised a claim of Rs 450 crores for the 60 acres it is required to return to the state government. The army doesn’t know its history and how it came to be housed in Secunderabad. Worse the state government still seems ignorant about its rights vis a vis land with the military. Revanth Reddy and the Chief Secretary will do well to bone up on the facts.
Cantonments are enclaves with a mix of civilian and military populations. There are 62 of them in India. Though they are located in various states, all of them are administered by Central Government through Ministry of Defence.
It is generally assumed that public lands in cantonments belong to Govt of India. This is indeed true of cantonments which were located in British India prior to 1947. The British had either conquered these lands or had otherwise got their ownership. In 1947, ownership of public lands in these cantonments passed to Government of India.
However Secunderabad Cantonment was not located in British India. Hyderabad was a sovereign princely state prior to 1948. Public lands in Secunderabad were not owned by the British.
So who owns public lands in Secunderabad Cantonment today?
Most people assume that as in other cantonments, Govt of India also became owner of public lands in Secunderabad Cantonment after Operation Polo merged Hyderabad with India in 1948. But is this really true? The question is important because it has bearing on the resolution of several pressing public issues. These include:
• Civilians being illegally denied use of several public roads through cantonment by military authorities.
• Impossible financial demands made by Centre when the State approached it for land for road widening, Strategic Road Development Program (SRDP) and improving infrastructure.
• Lack of infrastructure development due to paucity of land, which contributes to the growing public demand for merger of cantonment with Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation
To understand who owns public lands in Cantonment one has to delve into Secunderabad’s history.
The East India Company signed a “Treaty of Subsidiary Alliance” with the second Nizam, Ali Khan, at the end of the 18th century (1798). This Treaty bound both signatories to provide their troops to each other against common enemies.
Consequently a “Subsidiary Force” of British troops was stationed in Hyderabad. The Nizam allocated an area on the shores of Hussain Sagar (near today’s Kavadiguda) for their camp. This new settlement attracted traders from all over India, who came to provide goods and services to the troops. The new town which emerged was named Secunderabad in 1806, after the then Nizam Sikandar Jah.
The treaty also bound the Nizam to provide his troops to the British. However the British, claiming that Nizam’s troops were poorly trained, raised a fresh contingent of local troops at Nizam’s expense. Known as the “Hyderabad Contingent”, these troops were quartered in Bolarum, 10 km north of Secunderabad.
Though the Nizam allowed British to occupy land for military purposes there is ample evidence to demonstrate that he did not give them ownership of the land. Consider:
• In 1906, Bolarum, Secunderabad and 13 intervening villages were merged to form the single entity now called “Secunderabad”. The firman issued by the Nizam to formalise this merger clearly states that only criminal (judicial) powers in the merged area were being transferred to British (for maintaining law and order); however land ownership remained with the original owners.
• The British themselves undertook several exercises to check whether they owned any land in Secunderabad. The most elaborate such exercise was by Sir William Barton in 1926. All these exercises concluded that British did not own any land in Secunderabad.
• In 1933 the British prepared the first comprehensive land record of Secunderabad, using the framework specified in the recently passed Cantonments Act, 1924. The Special Lands Officer appointed for preparing this “General Land Register (GLR)” stated that British did not own any land in Secunderabad.
• At least twice, Nizam took back land which was no longer required for military purpose.
In 1933 he took back Chaderghat Municipality, including the Residency itself (today’s Koti Women’s College) and the Residency Bazars.
In 1946, he took back the town area of Secunderabad south of today’s Rashtrapathi Road.
Numerous archival documents supporting the above assertions are available. So if British did not own the land, who owned it?
Well, a large portion of the land was directly owned by Nizam himself (the so called sarf-e-khas lands). Another significant chunk was under paigahs and jagirdars who collected land revenue – but even this land was ultimately owned by Nizam. Some land – diwani – belonged to Hyderabad Government. The rest was privately owned.
By 1948, sarf-e-khas and jagir lands together accounted for almost 80,000 sq km of the 2,10,000 sq km total area of Hyderabad. Oppression of peasants by this aristocracy had led to a violent, communist-supported peasants’ revolt a few years earlier. This revolt was still ongoing in 1948. To quell the revolt land reforms to ensure more equitable land ownership were essential.
Archival information shows that the Ministry of States under Sardar Patel instructed Maj Gen J N Chaudhuri (appointed Administrator after he led Indian Army into Hyderabad) to convince the Nizam to hand over sarf-e-khas and jagir lands to the State.
The National Archives record the tortuous and protracted negotiations between the two. Finally the Nizam agreed to hand over these lands. This was formalised by passing two Regulations in 1358 Fasli (1949 AD) – “Hyderabad Sarf-e-Khas (Merger) Regulation” and “Hyderabad (Abolition of Jagirs) Regulation”. Overnight, 80,000 sq km of land owned by the aristocracy thus became diwani, or state land. This was perhaps the largest single land reform in independent India.
It is clear therefore that State is the owner of public lands in Secunderabad Cantonment.
Why then does it not assert its ownership? Why does it not take steps to reopen the illegally closed roads in Cantonment? To build sorely lacking infrastructure? Why does it negotiate financial terms with Central Government for land which actually belongs to it?
Does the State also believe that public land in Secunderabad Cantonment is Central Government property? This would be strange because the State has relied on 1948 Sarf-e-khas (Merger) Regulation and Abolition of Jagirs Regulation in multiple court cases to successfully claim ownership of encroached lands. Does it believe that these Regulations do not apply in Cantonment?
Is it aware that in 1956 Govt of India actually had to purchase Rashtrapathi Nilayam from Govt of Andhra Pradesh? That since then many court cases successfully challenged Central Government’s claim of land ownership in cantonment? That there are Resolutions of Secunderabad Cantonment Board, and even internal reports of Government of India, which conclude that Central Government does not own public lands in Secunderabad Cantonment? Documentary evidence is available for all of the above.
It is time for State Government to understand the reality of these facts and act in the interest of the public.
