Bhoomi-Online delivery of land

records in Karnataka
Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievements Benefits Learnings Road Ahead

The project happened in Karnataka

Project coverage

ƒ 7 million farmers: 35
million beneficiaries

ƒ 20 million land records

(0.6 hectare average size
of holding)

ƒ 177 project locations

Bangalore 0.2 mn sq kms serving farmers from
27000 villages

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Its all about agricultural land record reforms

ƒ Data in land records
• Demographic data, Economic data, Legal rights
• 47 information ‘fields’ – owners, tenants, crops, yield,
irrigation sources, mortgage details, soil, bank loans etc

ƒ Critical to farmers
• Basis for ownership & loan

ƒ Instrument of social justice

• Poor records lead to litigation & social unrest
• Ensure government gets its due returns

ƒ Critical for economic growth

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

The manual system had infirmities

ƒ Opaque system - not ‘out there’ in public domain

ƒ Incidence of manipulation of records

ƒ Farmers’ dependence on village accountants

• Discretionary treatment
• Scope for citizen harassment

ƒ Ill suited for civic needs

• Cumbersome mutation (change in title) process
• Not updated regularly
• Desired information not readily available

Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

The essence of Bhoomi

Bhoomi is a farmer friendly mechanism

to access and update land records
using state of art technology

Bhoomi
Farmers availing services

Bhoomi
Farmers availing services

Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Land records : Then & Now

Manual records Computerised

Low visibility Transparency

Cumbersome Easy access

Dated records Up to date

Harassment Citizen friendly

Tamper Prone Secured

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

The path traversed-amazing numbers

ƒ Data entry
• 10000 plus officials underwent training on data preparation and
validation process
• Implementation at 27 locations simultaneously
• 20,000 man-months legacy data entry involving 1200 operators
• Validated 20 mn records through 6.7 mn farmers and 9000
Village officials
ƒ Bhoomi software & Training
• Requirement specification through 16 workshops-participatory
development
• 250 man-months development effort
• Development in local language
• 700 + village officials trained
• Continuous training on for over a year

Bhoomi
Data entry and verification process

Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead Road ahead

The transition in documentation

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Transparency ensures social equity

Status of mutation
request available to
farmers from kiosks
Right to information to
citizens under Bhoomi
Age wise pending
record status

Quality assurance and monitoring in BHOOMI

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Transparency ensures social equity

ƒ Gone are the days when Village Accountants would
be able to dole favors on extraneous considerations

First in first out mutations in Bhoomi

No more discretion to favor influential people

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

No more monopoly
ƒ Law has been amended to provide for alternate
authority for approval of mutation in case of delay
of 15 days after the statutory inquiry period of 30
days
• Manual system provided unlimited monopoly powers to
Revenue Inspector

Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Multiple stakeholders benefit

• Quick, harassment free

• Records tamper proof
• Simple mutation process
• Easier farm credit
• Less litigation

Bhoomi
• Protect govt. land
• Banks • Citizen friendly
• Judiciary
• Private firms
• Easy implementation
• Manpower redeployment
• Planning inputs

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Bhoomi has touched farmers’ lives

ƒ 40 million copies have been provided from the
Bhoomi kiosks

ƒ Mutation incidence has increased 3 fold

ƒ Land based litigation down

ƒ Private bodies & elected representatives have

contributed towards kiosks, PCs

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

What has Bhoomi achieved

ƒ Handwritten records fully substituted by computerised records-
a legal framework in place

ƒ Imposition of user charges with better delivery of services make

scheme viable and sustainable- Collection of Rs 15 million per
month as against total expenditure of Rs 180 million on project
• Till date Rs 600 million user charges collected

ƒ Land records in public domain

• No application, no identity requirements

ƒ Mutation requests acknowledged & tracked

ƒ Biometrics authentication- Non repudiation feature

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

What Bhoomi has achieved

ƒ State data centre established centralising 20 million
records
ƒ VSAT network connecting all 202 locations of
BHOOMI
ƒ Electronic integration of BHOOMI with KAVERI
(Registration project) in place
ƒ Survey process now being integrated into Bhoomi
• Integerated Mutation

Bhoomi
Bio-metric device

Bhoomi
Simple authentication

Bhoomi
Biometrics rejects hackers

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Lessons to Learn
ƒ E-governance scheme should provide no scope of
repudiation of actions
• Biometrics authentication- Non repudiation feature
ƒ Kill all alternatives ( old systems) to the scheme
• Handwritten records fully substituted by computerised
records- a legal framework in place
ƒ Self sustainability of scheme is essential
ƒ Existing bureaucracy is competent to execute big e-
governance projects

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Next steps in Bhoomi

ƒ Use Hand held devices like Simputer for online data
capture
• Avoid drudgery of current manual crop collection and batch
updation

ƒ Offloading distribution of records to privates sector

• By providing connectivity to Bhoomi data base
• 800 rural telecentres coming up starting next month
ƒ Providing value added services to farmers from
rural telecentres
• Citizen id, Government schemes details, mandi rates,
weather info
ƒ Provision of bhoomi data to private sector on cost
basis

Bhoomi
 The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Next steps in Bhoomi

ƒ Personalising Bhoomi for every farmer
• Concept of mypage.com
• To create personalised information for every farmer
depending upon factors like extent of land, irrigation
sources, crops grown etc
• To provide information like the fertiliser he needs for the
land
• The crop he should grow
ƒ Evolving Urban Bhoomi
• Scheme is being extended to urban municipalities
ƒ And eventually graduating to Torrens system
( State to guarantee land title on the basis of
entries in records)

Bhoomi
The genesis The concept Achievement Benefits Learnings Road ahead

Efforts towards Replication

ƒ Bhoomi is now declared to be the national model for replication in all stated by
MIT GOI and has provided an initial funds of Rs 300 million for this replication
ƒ Visitors from almost all states of the country have visited and studied Bhoomi
ƒ Visitors from many other countries have shown interest in collaboration

ƒ Detailed study of Bhoomi by World Bank made available on its website for
facilitating replication. (www.worldbank.org/publicsector/egov)

ƒ World Bank and Ford foundation have got done an independent evaluation of
the BHOOMI project

ƒ Apart fromwinning silver in CAPAM, Bhoomi was one of the finalist in

Stockholm challenge award 2002 and TechMuseum innovation award
California
ƒ And now UN Public service award

Bhoomi
 Thank You

Rajeev Chawla
Secretary e-Governance DPAR (AR)
and Special Secretary (Bhoomi)
Revenue Department
Govt of Karnataka
E-mail:
Secyegov-dpar@karnataka.gov.in
Website: www.bhoomi.kar.nic.in

Bhoomi