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The Punjab government on Friday freed 2,828 acres of illegally encroached land in the foothills of the Shivalik Mountains from the possession of various influential people including the son of Shiromani Akali Dal's MP Simranjit Singh Mann.
"Yesterday we freed 2,828 acres of illegally encroached land worth more than Rs 350 Crore from the area in Block Majri of SAS Nagar. Many influential people including the son and son-in-law of MP Simranjit Singh Mann had occupied the land. They got panchayat and forest land registered in their name," state Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann told ANI on Saturday. The CM informed that they had initiated their campaign to free up the encroached lands on May 1. There are properties of land size over thousands of acres which belong to the Panchayat and/or to the forest department and are being illegally held by certain politicians and their close aides, CM Mann said. He further added that this recovered land includes atleast 250 acres of field and over 2,600 acres of mountainous region where Khair trees (having wood worth Rs 50-60 crores) are found. "It will be probed how these encroachers had occupied the land. So far, 9,053 acres of land have been freed from encroachers and have been handed over to the panchayat and forest department," he said. Accusing both the Congress and Shiromani Akali Dal of being involved in these illegal land grabs, he said that a probe to identify how these people got their hands over the Panchayat's land is underway. Asserting that he has always been mocked by the opposition for the availability of funds to fulfil election promises, CM Mann said, "I always said that the money will be generated from the Shivaliks, what we have freed yesterday is merely a sample of our promise." He further promised to use the recovered amount for the people of Punjab in the form of Mohalla clinics, schools, roads, and free electricity. (ANI)
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