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necessarily be given by the person who has first At the district level, the Collector heads the
hand knowledge of the facts. Revenue Collection System. The District
Where to File an FIR? Magistrate is also called Collector because of his
An FIR can be filed in the police station of the association with the Revenue Collection System.
concerned area in whose jurisdiction the offence DISTRICT COLLECTOR
has occurred. At first, an FIR is to obtain infor- The Deputy Commissioner or the District
mation about the alleged criminal activity so as Collector is the head of civil administration in a
to be able to take suitable steps for tracing and district. He supervises the collection of land
bringing to book the guilty person. revenue and the maintenance of land records.
Its secondary though equally important object is The government undertakes the responsibility of
to obtain early information of an alleged criminal preparing the records. For the purpose of reve-
activity and to record the circumstances before nue collection, districts are divided into subdivi-
the trial, lest such circumstances are forgotten or sions and then into tehsils or talukas. A number
embellished. of villages constitute a pargana. The Patwari
collects revenue in villages, Kanungo in
MAINTENCANCE OF LAND RECORDS
parganas and Tehsildar in tehsils. The Naib
Land disputes are the most frequent cause of
Tehsildar helps the Tehsildar. At the subdivision
dispute in rural areas. It often happens that a
level, this work is done by the Sub Divisional
person forcibly tries to occupy someone else’s
Magistrate (SDM).
land. Some people are socially and economically
more powerful in a village than some other THE PATWARI
people. The powerful person may try to grab the Let us understand the role of a Patwari with an
land of a less powerful person. In such a situa- example. What if Ramu and Shamu are two
tion, people from the SCs/STs and OBCs are farmers who have their plots next to each other
usually at the receiving end. Sometimes, land and don’t know the boundary? They go to the
disputes can also arise among people of the village Patwari to solve their confusion. Thus, a
same caste. Patwari is a person who is in-charge of measur-
ing land in Indian villages.
Tehsildar or Patwari or Kanungo or
Karmchari or Land Record Officer He holds a record book of details like the map of
the land, the crops that are grown there, the
The person who is responsible for collecting land
owner’s name, etc. In case there arises a confu-
revenue from the village is known by different
sion regarding the border between two different
names in different parts of India. Some names
plots, the farmers can approach the Patwari of
are given above. The Patwari is the lowest state
the village and get the confusion solved. He is
functionary in the Revenue Collection System.
The Patwari system was first introduced by Sher usually in charge of a group of villages.
Shah Suri. This system was further developed by
DO YOU KNOW?
Akbar.
In recent years, attempts have been made to comput-
Land Revenue : Since the times when the early
erise all important information. In fact Mandla
kingdoms and empires flourished in India, land
Panchayat in Panna district in Madhya Pradesh has
revenue has been a major source of revenue for
done away with any kind of paper work. Okha, a
the government. The government charges some coastal village in Gujarat, was the first out of 5.5 lakh
tax for the land holding on an annual basis.
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