Telangana Govt constitutes high-level committee to resolve controversy over Section 22A lands

Account subscription benefits alongside Premium Stories, Editorials, Opinions and more. Unlock these with Subscription

Telangana Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy speaking on the issues pertaining to Section 22A of Registration Act, during the monsoon session of Legilsative Assembly in Hyderabad on Wednesday (September 16, 2026). | Photo Credit: BY ARRANGEMENT

The Telangana Government has decided to put an end to the raging controversy over inclusion of vast stretches of private lands in the Section 22A of the Registration Act.

Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy has announced constitution of a high-level official committee to study the issue in-depth and suggest remedial measures so that not a single genuine land owner is adversely affected. The high power committee comprising Law Secretary, Chief Commissioner of Land Administration (CCLA), Commissioner of Registration and Stamps and other senior officials, has been given a 30 day deadline to study the issue and submit its recommendations.

The Chief Minister attributed the absence of sub division of lands by successive governments that resulted in piling up of the number of lands placed under Section 22A and said that his government is firm on evolving a mechanism in this direction.

In a marathon speech in the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday (September 16, 2026) in response to the charges made by the Opposition members against inclusion of lands in Part–B, he said the Congress Government had in fact brought down the number from 21.93 lakh acres to around 17 lakh acres ever since it started the exercise to cleanse the revenue records that were corrupted by the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) government. Several anomalies in the land record updation programme, launched by the previous government, paved the way for enlarging the list of prohibited lands.

The present government initiated the exercise to identify genuine lands and those under encroachments as the High Court took a serious view of huge pendency of Part-B lands. It was accordingly revealed that entries into the prohibited lands list was partly due to clerical errors and partly because of technical issues.

“Lands in the prohibited list were not deleted despite government selling the lands to different agencies and subsequent transactions that took place,” he said.

Tracing the origin of Section 22A to the 1990s, he said the then Congress regime under Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy enacted a legislation in 2007 for ensuring that lands owned by the government, Endowments, Wakf, Forest and others were protected from encroachments by placing them in the prohibited list. “These lands measuring around 98 lakh acres should be kept in the prohibited list. Can we remove them from the list so that they become vulnerable to encroachments?” he asked daring the BRS to clarify its stand on the issue.

The lists of these lands were however not circulated at the sub registrar level resulting in preparation of sale deeds pertaining to them in the due course.