Antony to the defence

Defence Minister AK AntonyThe Ministry of Defence (MoD) is tabling a Bill in

Parliament to protect nearly 17 lakh acres of defence land that is being pilfered by vested
interests. The proposed Defence Land Management Bill hopes to pre-empt an upcoming
Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report that accuses the MoD of inaction after
multiple defence land scams. The report indicts the ministry for failing to protect 17.3
lakh acres of defence land-the largest land bank in the country-worth an estimated Rs 20
lakh crore. A lax land management policy means that only one-third of the MoD's land
holding has been transferred into civil revenue records. Nearly two-thirds of defence land
continue to be in the name of individuals from whom the ministry acquired it.

Defence Minister A.K. Antony's ministry has been severely embarrassed in the past two
years by a series of scandals revolving around the grabbing of defence land like in
Mumbai's controversial Adarsh Housing Society. As part of a cleanup exercise, Antony
appointed a non-controversial official Ashok Kumar Harnal as director general to cleanse
the department and has ordered a speed-up of digitisation of the defence estates
department's land records that has been on since 2006. Antony hinted at this drafted Bill
when he informed a parliamentary standing committee about new policies in the offing
because "vested interests are exploiting the gaps in the defence land".

Of the 17.3 lakh acres of defence land, only two lakh acres or 11 per cent is located
within the 62 cantonments and is well-protected. It is the remaining 15.3 lakh acres that is
actually vulnerable. cbi investigations into the Adarsh Housing Society scam reveal how
builders, defence estates officials and army personnel colluded to usurp defence land that
fell outside the Colaba military station.

A draft copy of the CAG report indicts two lieutenant-generals posted as southern army
commanders in Pune and a defence estates official for coming together to help a private
club grab 1.17 acres of prime government land in the Pune Cantonment worth Rs 2.14
crore. A similar nexus was revealed by the cbi investigations into the Adarsh scam:
Defence estates officials colluded with army officials to get defence land transferred to a
private housing society. These are the 'vested interests' that Antony mentioned and this
nexus has worked throughout the country to grab precious defence land.

The MoD's proposed Act seems to be drafted to cover such loopholes. It forbids the
alternation in the classification of defence land-as was done in the case of Adarsh-a
common malpractice used by defence estates officials and military personnel to make
money. The Bill prohibits the sale of defence land and restarts the practice of land audits,
a mandatory task that was inexplicably stopped nearly a decade ago. Specific clauses
prohibiting 'issuance of No Objection Certificate (NOC) by custodian of defence land to
individual or agencies who seek it for institutional or commercial purpose' are meant to
prevent scams like at the Sukna military station.

But in its attempt to protect defence land, the Bill actually hands back the keys of the
lucrative defence land bank to the scam-tainted Directorate General of Defence Estates
(DGDE). At least a dozen serving officials in the DGDE have been chargesheeted for
various misdemeanours involving defence land. The DGDE's vigilance chief R.K. Singh
is being probed for his role in granting an NOC for the 2004 sale of defence land to a
private developer. The land overlooks the army's sensitive Central Ordnance Depot in
Mumbai.

The proposed Act gives constitutional protection to the DGDE, which has been tasked
with maintaining all defence land through its representative, the defence estates officer
(DEO), in various military stations. Last year, the MoD's Controller General of Defence
Accounts (CGDA) recommended abolishing the DGDE for failing in all its tasks of audit,
accounting, financial management and land acquisition. The CGDA recommended
redistributing the DGDE's functions among the armed forces and other audit bodies.

Under the proposed Act, the DGDE is also tasked with auditing land. "How can the
DGDE be expected to audit its own decisions? Why hasn't the MoD asked its auditors to
do it?" asks a senior army official. The opacity surrounding defence land-the DGDE is
the sole custodian of tattered paper records-ensures that ambiguity over the ownership of
land continues and scams remain uncovered. A CAG report tabled in Parliament in 2001
said there were 22 lakh acres of defence land. The figure mysteriously shrunk to 17.3
lakh acres a few years ago. There was no explanation to the loss of nearly five lakh acres.

A senior DGDE official, however, denied that the Bill was a response to the defence land
scams. "The Bill has been in the pipeline for some years. It was one of the suggestions
made by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence. We are sending the draft to
all stakeholders in defence land," the official said.

In the meantime, the standing committee is working on another report that pinpoints the
Government's failures to protect its land holding. "We are extremely concerned. Looting
of defence land is a scandal as serious as the loss of other scarce public resources like
spectrum," says Mysoora Reddy, Telugu Desam Party MP and member of the
Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence. BJD MP Jay Panda, however, is of the
view that while the Act should crack down on abuse and profiteering of defence land, it
"should leave scope for genuine development activities for soldiers on defence land".

While the Act prohibits defence lands for construction or reconstruction of shopping
complexes, it regularises existing shopping complexes. It recommends a transparent
policy for allotment of shops and shopping complexes by the local military authority. The
Act says 50 per cent of the rent and premium can be kept for the welfare of the troops and
the remainder deposited in the government treasury. Again, the DEOs have been asked to
maintain a complete record of all such shops and complexes.

The DGDE has just 1,251 personnel, most of whom are busy fighting at least 13,000
pending court cases challenging land acquisitions for the armed forces. It could cost the
Government over Rs 5,000 crore and several decades to fight and win these cases. In the
meantime, the department is stagnating. Recruitment into the DGDE has virtually halted.
The proposed Act is silent on what it plans to do to revive the department. Like many
other serious ailments, the Act seems yet another attempt at putting band-aid on a
comatose patient.