Curation Team
HYDERABAD: The stage is set for the forensic audit of land records in the state with Telangana Technology Services Limited (TGTS) to enter into an agreement with a Kerala-based security audit agency in a week.
After the state govt approved the proposal to conduct a forensic audit of records a month ago, the revenue department has asked TGTS to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the agency.
Sources in the revenue department confirmed the terms and conditions were approved by the law department a week ago, and the agreement would be signed with the Kerala-based agency in a week. According to official sources, all the suspicious land transactions in districts, especially Rangareddy, Medchal-Malkajgiri, Hyderabad, Sangareddy, Yadadri-Bhuvanagiri, Sircilla, and Siddipet districts, would be taken up initially, and the audit might be extended to other districts in later phases.
The state govt had in Dec last year announced that a forensic audit would be conducted on suspicious land transactions on the Dharani portal, which was launched by the previous BRS govt in Sept 2020. Chief minister A Revanth Reddy and revenue minister Ponguleti Srinvias Reddy had also announced in the assembly that the govt would probe the irregularities in land transactions as some transactions were done at midnight and some even took place from other countries. They even suspected that the Dharani servers were in other countries.
“The govt will provide data on govt and prohibited land parcels in various districts before 2014, after the Dharani land portal was launched, and the present status. The agency will also look into transactions and give a report in three months,” a senior official said.
The agency would be asked to probe if there was any tampering of land records, place, and time of the suspected illegal land transactions. The forensic audit could be done via digital footprint and blockchain technology, but it is not clear which one will be used by the firm. A digital footprint, also known as a digital fingerprint or digital dossier, is the data a person generates when using the internet for any type of activity linked to that person’s individual identity. This encompasses the entire online activity, both via and outside the person’s accounts, IP addresses, and transaction history on devices connected to the internet.
