Hyderabad: Protect Bhoodan lands, demands Sarvodaya Mandal

Domalguda: Members of the Telangana Sarvodaya Mandal and Sarva Seva Sangh protested on Friday at Dharna Chowk demanding protection of Bhoodan lands and urging the government to provide land to landless poor.

Chandan Pal, national president, All-India Sarva Seva Sangh, addressing the participants in the dharna, alleged a multi-crore scam of Bhoodan lands in the State. He urged the government to set up Bhoodan Yagna Board and distribute the land to the landless poor. He recalled that Acharya Vinoba Bhave had started the Bhoodan Movement in April 1951 for distribution of land to the poor. "Many landlords in Telangana donated thousands of acres of land to the Bhoodan Movement".

He said Bhave had handed over the responsibility of setting up Bhoodan Yagna Board with instructions of Sarva Seva Sangh and distributing Bhoodan lands to the State government. He lamented that then and later governments had distributed 20 per cent land to the poor and the remaining 80 per cent had been alienated to a large extent due to official indifference.

Sangh president R Shankar Nayak said, " around 74,400 acres of Bhoodan land that remained unaccounted for was within Nalgonda, Mahbubnagar, Rangareddy and Medak districts, adjoining Hyderabad. "The government is not taking any action against Bhoodan land grabbers and not reclaiming them".

Sangh national general secretary Gouranga Chandra Mohapatra, Sangh trustee Shaik Hussain, former MP Syed Aziz Pasha, CPM State secretariat member DG Narasimha Rao, CPI Hyderabad district Secretary E T Narasimha participated in the dharna.