Digital Survey Options for Inclusive Land Rights Mapping Land Tenure Security through Digitally-Inclusive Land Governance

Pranab R Choudhury Centre for Land Governance,

NRMC

Updated Land Records .. Land Tenure Security

2. Gaps

5. Road Ahead

4. Learning

1. Need3. Flag posts

India’s Land Records Landscape

Need

• DILRMP aims to digitise Land Records ( Rural) for CONCLUSIVE TITLING • Rural land is 181 million ha • 264 million total number of parcels as reported

Updating Land Records

•FRA, 2006 will recognise 40 million ha (CFR & IFR) • Recognised Rights to be integrated in RoR & digital registry

Integrating Forest Rights

• About 15 million ha in North East India; mostly un-surveyed and without land records

• Customary tenure in PESA area not recorded in formal system

Recording Customary Tenure

• Land grant (Homestead, Single women, usufruct, bhoodan/ceiling surplus distribution): about 0.5 million in Odisha alone

• Slum dweller Rights (e.g. 0.2 million in Odisha alone; excl main cities)

Integrating New Rights

LAND Rights to Record : Indian Landscape

1. Record Updating : DILRMP Status (Nov, 2017)Records computerized 86% & Maps digitized 46%

1. Record Updating : DILRMP Status (Nov 17)Final Map after resurvey in 2% villages

1. Big Barriers to Conclusive Titling,

• Most Land Rights changes/transfers not registered

• All registered are not mutated (converted to Records)

• All Land records are not digitized & made online

• Land records created but Maps not updated (only sketch prepared)

• Land records computerized but maps not updated

• Cadastral map digitized, not geo-referenced/not updated

Actual (Field)

Textual (Digital/Hard

Record))Spatial (Cadastra

l map)

SCOPE : 40 m ha forest land in 1.7 million villages with 150 million people (about 25 million ST & OTFD)

2.NEW RECORDS : FOREST RIGHTS Potential & Achievement

So far 4.2 million claims made; 1.8 million recognized; 5.6 million ha

3. NEW RECORDS TO BE CREATED Largely Un-surveyed Customary Tenure Landscapes

• Schedule V and VI areas • India’s Belly • North East(Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya)

• Other Tribal states with special provisions • Manipur- Hill areas (371 c), Nagaland (371 a), Mizoram (371 G), Arunachal (371 H)

Schedule V, VI & Geographies under Special Provisions

Schedule VI

Article 371 C

Article 371 A

371 G

Article 371 H

3. Un-surveyed Commons/Govt lands in Odisha

De-facto common land in Odisha (as % to total Village land)

Private land70%

SarbaSadharan1%

Rakshit11%

AbadAjogyaAnabadi9%

AbadJogyaAnabadi9%

De jure Common Land as % total Village land

(Gochar+ Gramya Jungle + Sarbasadharan)

Common7%

Govt23%

Pvt70%

NSSO (1998) : 11% of the state’s area with a per HH CPLR at 0.28 ha ( 50% of HH area - 0.58 ha)

Census, 2001: de-facto commons to 38% of village Draft National land Reform Policy, 2013 Definition : 31%

Excluding Forest land

4. Homestead & other Land GrantsCould be a minimum of 10 million

• About 3 million homestead & agricultural land distributed in Odisha (LGAF Report, 2014)

• 2.2 million distributed in Andhra Pradesh (LGAF Report, 2014) • 4.1 million beneficiary households under ceiling surplus,

tenancy, and homestead plots in West Bengal, till 2001

Yawning Gaps OR Landscapes of Opportunities?

One Time Creation & Updating of Land Records

> 1.5 billion Parcels Syncing > 264 million Land Records (~ 1 bn parcels; excluding unrecorded/yet to be recorded in surveyed villages)- DILRMP goal Forest Rights : IFR already recognised – 1.8 m; Potential 25 million parcels Customary Tenure ~ 10 m Parcels Land Grants/Others :~10 m Parcels

Regular Updating

15 million parcels every year

At least 10% to update inheritance, sub division, sale/purchase etc.

Multipurpose Cadaster

Linking and using land rights information for development: Sharing & Integrating Layers for Land use and development, monitoring change, finance, insurance, compensation, direct subsidy transfer, Minimum Support Price, Service provisions, Rent, Taxation

Assumptions/basis: 3.6 parcels/record(khatiyan) as per Bhulekh, Odisha; Area per parcel = 0.6 acres (Bhulekh , Odisha) Area per holding (DILRMP: Govt & Private) : 0.7 ha (Total Surveyed Area: 265 m ha; Rural Area 181 m ha Area of Operational Holdings (Ag Census) : 160 million ha; Average area of holding: 1.15 ha

LAND RECORD GAPS:Costs Heavily to Community, Govt & Corporates

• Globally 75% of the land tenure not documented (Cadasta, 2018) • 66% civil court cases in India are related to land; mostly due to land records

(Daksh, 2017) • Land conflicts, cost heavily to Governments, Community and Corporates

• 14% of the announced projects during 2000-15 bottlenecked • Impact investments worth over Rs 12 trillion (RRI, 2017) • Land market barrier responsible for 1.3% growth loss

• Most urban property in India remain unregistered. At least 30 people gets forcibly evicted every hour in India in cities. (HLRN, 2018)

• Land Records in most states of India lack ‘gender’ column • Concealed & unrecorded tenancy is a major reason behind agrarian crisis in India

CAPACITY…TECHNOLOGY…PROCESS…..

2. GAPS

1. Capacity Gaps(LGAF Reports, 2014; World Bank)

• Massive Vacancies in Land Revenue Department • Less time available for Land Works • Lesser time for Land Records • Squeezed skills & resources • Limited to no exposure to modern tools

2. Technology Gaps• MODERN Technologies in USE

• DILRMP Survey/Resurvey : HRSI, ETS-DGPS, Aerial Survey • Other Government Initiatives: Drone (Slum Mapping Odisha), GPS

(Forest Rights) • Non-Government Initiative : GPS (FRA)

• Differential Capacity and Exposures by states • Different Legal space for technologies • Resource for accessing technology (Alleged low Unit Cost of DILRMP) • Limited fit between Technology & Context • Social & Legal Constraints

3. Process Gap : An Example of Forest RightsFRC facilitates

claims Joint Verification

Conducted

Gram Sabha decides &

forwards the Claims to SDLC

SDLC decides & Forwards

DLC recognize Forest Rights

Revenue & Forest Department

conducts mapping & integrate IFR

into ROR

Legal Prescription

Receive Claims Prepare record of claims, list of claimants & verify (include map prep- Rule 12); presents before Gram Sabha {Rule 11(2)}

As invited by FRC. officials of the Forest and Revenue dept shall remain present during the verification of the claims and evidences on the site and shall sign the proceedings with their designation, date and comments

Consider the findings of the FRC, pass appropriate resolutions, and shall forward the same to the SDLC

SDLC can send the claims back to Gram Sabha or can reject with reasons there of; shall not insist upon any particular form of documentary evidence for consideration of a claim (Rule 12 A – 6, 7,10)

DLC approves or reject with reasons there of; shall not insist upon any particular form of documentary evidence for consideration of a claim (Rule 12 A – 6, 7,10)

Prepare a final map of the forest land so vested and incorporate the forest rights in the revenue and forest records, within the specified period of record updation State within a period of 3 months,. Rule 12 A (9)

Actual Practice

Government Driven (Usually District Leadership), NGO Driven Or Partnership Mode; Rent seeking, Sketch Map without field measurement/ chain survey, Record manually prepared and manually entered at Tehsil in Bhulekh, Bhunaxa un-updated , Area approximate or measured from map/sometimes through chain survey, location and land use not always checked, possession recognized or new area suggested LAND RECORDS RECEIVED NOT LAND PER SE

Gram Sabha’s Role : receiving claims, consolidating and verifying them and prepar map delineating the area of each recommended claim FRC : No committee or individual official at the panchayat, block or forest range level except the forest rights committee shall be eligible to receive, decide or reject the forest rights claims Rule 12 A (11 -2) 2. The satellite imagery and other uses of technology may supplement other form of evidence and shall not be treated as a replacement.]

Govt Led Initiatives: Many a time, IFR is allotted by the official out of available Govt land, not recognizing existing Right as per FRA Areas in decimal noted through measurement on the map mostly or through chain survey of boundary sidesNGO/Community Led: Measurements and locations are largely very approximate Example of a trace map prepared for IFR

claim by Local Revenue Officer

Flag posts International & Normative Expectations

The WISH LIST• Expeditious Mapping & documentation of Unrecorded Land Rights & Updating of

existing records • Institutionalisation of a System for regular updating, digital integration & access • Participation of Community, local institutions and Government • Establishment of an Ecosystem for integrated delivery of technical, legal and

allied land administration services • Partnership of locally accountable and acceptable service providers with

Technology, Legal & Land Administration Stakeholders • Affordability, transparency, accessibility, equitability of the mapping,

documentation & land administrative services • Provision for registration of all types of rights/tenures, and recording of

secondary rights and complex tenures; avoiding historial injustice • Simplicity, quick recording techniques, minimal costs, reproducibility and

relevance • Exploring technology synergy and focusing on fit for purpose

Updating & Creating LAND RECORDS

Learning from Ground

Mapping Forest Villages in OdishaFES & Community with Mobile augmented DGPS

Village meeting before Mapping

Tenure Transact/Mapping

Personal & Parcel Information Collection

DGPS Survey by Community & Community Surveyor

Mapping an un-surveyed Forest Village

Mapping an un-surveyed Forest Village

IFR Claim maps of Ambabadi, Odisha : Easy discovery of Overlapping/Non-eligible Claims with existing Rights as per Cadastral Map (Private plots; Government plots with non-forest land use) can help claim making more robust and effective

239 parcels belonging to 39 households mapped in 8 days including all community & legal process in Field

Confirmation of map with Community

Claim Application Form with Map

Post-Right Potential: Village map in QGIS with plot numbers

Post-Right Potential: Spatial distribution of Land Use

Post-Right Potential: Spatial distribution of Caste land

MappingthroughDroneandDGPSinGujaratbyTranserveTechnologies

Drone&DGPS1.Drone–tocaptureveryhighresolutionimageoftheentirearea

2.DGPS–tocapturehighaccuracylocationdata

3.Markersinfieldaregeo-locatedbasedonDGPSandtheDronecapturesthesameduringitsflight

4.Dronefliesinsuchamannertogetoverlap(30%)imagesfortheentirearea

5.Imagesgotrectifiedandmergedtoproduceasingleimage

6.Alsocaptured3Ddata

DGPS• Usedforgeo-rectifyingthedroneimages• Usedtodelineatetheboundariesoneachplot• Thesearepointdataoneachcorner/bends• Overlaidandmatchedonthedroneimage

Output• Boundaryofeachplotmarkedonahighresolutionimagesforhigheraccuracyevenin3D

• ProvidebackgroundviewforeasyunderstandingbynonGISpeople

Road AheadLocalisation Policy & Practice

Data and Information Management at Gram Panchayat level

•Gram Panchayat level Common Service Centres •Skilled Local Youth •Scope of integration of Tenure Map with Land use Plan

Using & Linking to Existing Database/ Portals

• Linking to Government databases: NIC, DILRMP • Cadasta Platform/Transerve Platform/India Observatory • Data Ecosystem for sharing & inter-operability

Locating Opportunities for Localisation • Licensed local community surveyors; Gram panchayat wise • Local service providers • Meeting local demand, locally

Policy-Practice : Opportunities & Regulations • Forest Rights Act (FRA)

• Mapping by Gram Sabha • Use of Mobile App/ GPS

• Odisha/Bihar Special Survey & Settlement Act/Rule• Licensed Surveyors • DGPS Technology

• Skill Mission• Skilling Rural Youth

• Similar Experiments• Bhoomi Bandhu (BRAC), USAID-MAST, CRP (Landesa/WGWLO)

• Regulations• Drone • Data localisation

Work in Progress…..

2.2 technology PLATFORMCommunity Empowering, Socio-Legal Integrating & Fit for Purpose

Focus on downsized technology• Geolysis DGNSS: A smartphone connected high accuracy mapping system; • Use signals in multiple frequencies from multiple navigation satellite

constellations viz. GPS, Glonass, Beidou, GAGAN, Galileo etc.; • Use “carrier phase” measurement for centimetre grade accuracy; • Seamlessly integrates with mobile devices over blue tooth and interacts with

mapping application for hassle free surveying; • Integration of Background satellite image and geo-referenced cadastral map

layers, improves participation, and avoid overalapping and inappropriate claims;

• Capable of both real-time and post processing workflows; • Data processing handled by backend servers enabling field survey by non-

technical users; • Capable of continuous measurement mode or stop and go method surveying

without compromising on the accuracy

Background layersCadastral boundary Satellite Imagery Toposheet

DGPS Receivers for the Mobile App• The system works on a pair of devices. A

base and a rover • Base/reference station is fixed at a known

position near the site; Rover is taken to the field for surveying

• Data from both the base and rover is copied to a computer for processing

• Integration with mobiles over bluetooth simplifies the survey process reducing overheads for high accuracy mapping

DGPS Operation