Report on Bettiah Raj property

Patna: A status report on land of the Bettiah Raj is expected to be ready in three months.

State board of revenue chairman-cum-member Sunil Kumar Singh shared this information here on Tuesday on the sidelines of a meeting of officials from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, who are associated with the management of the property of the erstwhile Raj. The member of the revenue board happens to be the custodian of the assets of the Bettiah Raj.

According to the records last updated in 1897, the Bettiah Raj has 14,251 acres of land in Bihar and 122 acres in Uttar Pradesh. While the Raj’s property Raj in Bihar is spread in West Champaran, East Champaran, Saran, Siwan and Gopalganj districts, in Uttar Pradesh, the assets are spread in Varanasi, Allahabad, Faizabad, Deoria, Kusinagar, Basti, Gorakhpur and Mirzapur districts.

“We are aiming to complete the survey for generating the status report of the Raj land in three months,” Singh said.

He added that services of amins, who have expertise in measuring land, had been engaged for this purpose.

While 29 amins have been deputed in Bihar for this work, the corresponding figure stands at seven in Uttar Pradesh.

Tuesday’s meeting had been convened to collect inputs from field officials and suggest them ways to ensure timely completion of survey work, which would help in generating the status report.

Sharing the purpose of the exercise for generating a status report, Singh said as custodian of the property, the board of revenue stood for optimum utilisation of the property to generate revenue. “Also,” he added: “The status report would help us in finding out whether any land has been encroached or not, whether someone had sold part of the property using fake documents or not. Once we have these details, legal action would be taken to get back the property.”

At present, a sum of around Rs 1.25 crore is generated annually as revenue from the Bettiah Raj property against which Rs 90 lakh is spent yearly to meet recurring expenses.

The history of the Bettiah Raj dates back to the Mughal period and the first ruler of the kingdom was Uday Karan Singh, one of the army commanders of Akbar. Impressed by the victory of Uday over gypsies in 1579 AD, who used to create trouble in areas north of Ganga in Bihar, Akbar had asked Uday to take control of the Champaran region.

Harendra Kishore was the last king of the Bettiah Raj. He died in 1893. After his death, his wife continued to manage the kingdom till her death in 1954 after which the property of the Bettiah Raj came under the control of the Bihar government.

Courtesy: The Telegraph