Examiner Bureau | Srinagar:
For generations, land records in Jammu and Kashmir have been associated with registers, maps, mutations and visits to revenue offices. That system is now undergoing a major digital transformation, with the government saying the Union Territory has achieved 100 per cent digitisation across its foundational land administrative units, covering all 20 districts, 207 tehsils and 6,818 villages.
The scale of the exercise is reflected in the numbers. According to the Revenue Department, 68,62,596 land parcels, or Khasras, have been digitised, while a backlog of 6,47,274 mutations has been incorporated across all 20 districts, leaving no pending mutation backlog.
The progress was reviewed at a meeting chaired by Chief Secretary Atal Dulloo, where officials took stock of land-record digitisation as well as the implementation of AgriStack, Farmer IDs, Unique Land Parcel Identification Numbers (ULPINs), BhuNaksha and the proposed integration of digital land records with the Reserve Bank of India’s Unified Lending Interface (ULI).
The exercise is moving beyond simply putting old records online. Through AgriStack, the administration is attempting to build a more integrated digital database connecting farmers, land parcels and agricultural activity.
Against a base of 71,04,737 Khasras across 6,818 villages, data entry has been completed for 65,77,944 Khasras. Of these, 58,17,502 have been verified and 57,30,681 approved, representing 80.7 per cent of the total base.
The progress, however, is not uniform across every village.
In Jammu division, 2,770 of 3,750 villages have been fully approved, with a Khasra approval rate of 80.8 per cent. In Kashmir division, 1,945 of 3,068 villages have been fully approved, with an overall approval rate of 80.5 per cent.
So far, 1,21,472 Farmer IDs have been generated across 1,663 villages. Kashmir division accounts for 70,979 IDs across 836 villages, while Jammu division has generated 52,751 IDs across 827 villages.
The government has directed Deputy Commissioners to ensure that no eligible farmer is left out of the registration process.
Another major component of the exercise is the Kharif 2026 Digital Crop Survey, which is being conducted across 5,714 villages and covers around 30.61 lakh agricultural plots.
According to the government, survey work has already been completed for 30,61,696 plots, representing 96.55 per cent progress. Supervisors have approved 27,27,189 plots.
The data is expected to provide a more detailed digital picture of agricultural land use, while forming part of the broader effort to integrate land and farm-related information.
The digital identity of land parcels is also being strengthened through Unique Land Parcel Identification Numbers, or ULPINs.
As of September 25, ULPIN coverage had expanded to 5,275 villages, compared with 4,078 during the previous review.
The number of ULPINs generated has risen to 33,47,011, an increase of 4,08,887.
The expansion is intended to make individual land parcels easier to identify within the digitised land-record system.
The transformation also extends to the maps that form the backbone of traditional land records.
Under the BhuNaksha initiative, of the 6,818 village maps, 6,468 have been handed over to BISAG-N, while 6,049 have been received back.
Geo-referencing of 425 maps remains pending, while attribute tables for 5,754 maps have been completed.
The work involves collecting Shajra/Mussavi maps, geo-referencing them, creating Khasra-wise daughter maps, carrying out topology and boundary checks, integrating them with Jamabandi or Records of Rights and finally validating the information in the field through Patwaris.
The government’s next step could take the digital land-record system beyond revenue administration and into agricultural lending.
J&K is proposing to integrate its digitised land records with the RBI’s Unified Lending Interface through specialised APIs.
The proposed system is intended to allow secure access to land and farm-related information needed for agricultural lending, including landowner and parcel details, farm parameters, mortgage information and crop data. It would also help flag existing loans.
The larger objective is to create a system in which verified digital land information can support access to institutional agricultural credit.
The digitisation drive is also being accompanied by a substantial grievance-resolution exercise.
The Revenue Department has received 14,48,748 grievances, of which 14,38,571 were non-quasi-judicial. As many as 14,27,576 non-quasi-judicial grievances have been resolved.
The figures underline the scale of the administrative workload involved in moving from traditional records to a digitised and integrated system.
Chief Secretary Dulloo directed officials to fix responsibility for undue delays, conduct regular field inspections and submit weekly progress reports.
ACS Finance Shailendra Kumar asked field agencies to prioritise farmers who are available in villages, noting that they constitute the overwhelming majority of the target population. Exceptional cases involving absentee farmers could be taken up later, he said.
He also asked Deputy Commissioners to frame operational guidelines for different situations encountered by field staff so that procedural issues do not hold up the exercise.
Revenue Secretary Kumar Rajeev Ranjan addressed issues raised by Deputy Commissioners and provided solutions, the government said.
The administration has now set fixed timelines for completing the remaining work.
Deputy Commissioners have been asked to complete the locking of RoR/Jamabandi within one month of Farmer ID generation, complete Farmer ID generation in all bucketed villages and resolve issues relating to unclaimed buckets and cross-district land parcels within two months.
Dulloo stressed that the objective should not be digitisation for its own sake, but the creation of accurate, updated and field-validated land records.
For J&K’s farmers and landowners, the significance of the exercise could ultimately lie in how easily these records can be accessed, verified and used for services and agricultural credit.
The meeting was attended by ACS Finance Shailendra Kumar, Revenue Secretary Kumar Rajeev Ranjan, Divisional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners and representatives of the RBI, BISAG-N and NIC.
