THE rainy season of 2025 proved to be even more devastating for Punjab than the 1988 floods. Weeks after the deluge, a scheme was announced for flood-hit villagers: “Jisda Khet, Usdi Ret” (whosoever owns the land shall own the sand). The state government probably regarded this initiative as a masterstroke.
The accumulation of sand in the fields due to floods troubled farmers earlier too; they spent lakhs of rupees to remove it. A couple of months ago, the government again announced that landowners could desilt rivers, choes and drains at their own expense and utilise the excavated material free of cost. Such an exercise involves severe hardships — which we ourselves underwent decades ago.
The year was 1967. Returning home from school one day, I found my family members distressed. I learnt that a small canal along our land had breached. After returning from the site, over 300 km from where we lived, my father told us that our entire crop, along with the crops on nearly 200 acres belonging to other farmers, had been ruined.
Nearly three feet of sand and bhall (sedimentary deposits) had spread over our 30 acres of land. Being a government official, my father was quite anxious because there were reports that cases of theft and taiwan (penalty) would be registered.
Fortunately, no theft case was filed. However, a taiwan case was lodged under Section 70 of the Northern India Canal Act, 1873, against all landowners of the command area. For 10 years, my father travelled to Abohar, about 50 km from our village, every two months to attend the court of the Executive Engineer, Irrigation (Collector). Having meagre means, he had to borrow money from banks and relatives to reclaim the land by removing the sand. A sum of about Rs 30,000 was spent over three years for the purpose. It took our family almost 20 years to repay the debt.
When I took over as Divisional Commissioner in 2006, I examined pending cases and listed them for regular hearing. One day, a canal-related case came up. To my astonishment, I found that it was my own village’s long-pending case.
Five lawyers and three litigants were present in the court. The Collector had imposed taiwan on all landholders, and they had appealed against his order before the Divisional Commissioner. Initially, I thought that since the Collector’s order appeared legally unsustainable, I should allow the appeal and quash the impugned order. However, since I was an interested party, I felt duty-bound to recuse myself from hearing the matter.
With a heavy heart, I transferred the case to the Financial Commissioner (Revenue), requesting that it be assigned to another competent court. Six decades have passed, but the case still awaits final adjudication.
The writer is a retired IAS officer based in Amritsar
