The Gujarat government on Wednesday announced a significant amendment in certain provisions of the Gujarat Land Revenue Code, 1879, aiming to simplify the revenue procedure under Section 135(d) of the Code.

Section 135(d) of Gujarat Land Revenue Code deals with the subject of registration of mutation entries of a property following a revenue transaction.

With the amendment, people will be exempted from the provision of 30-day mandatory notice period for registration of mutation entries in undisputed transactions, the government said.

Government spokesperson and senior minister Jitu Vaghani said that the government has decided to issue an ordinance in this regard.

In an official release, Vaghani said that owing to the mandatory 30-day notice period for registering sale of land or property, people had to wait for a long time. He added that some elements used to take advantage of the period to do blackmailing, by raising objections.

“Understanding this complexity, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel has taken a bold decision in the interest of the middle class and farmers (by) exempting (them) from the necessity of 30-days notice,” the release said, quoting Vaghani.

According to Vaghani, as per the new amendment, in transactions of undisputed properties fulfilling certain conditions, final mutation entry will be registered without following the process under Section 135(d) of the Code. The release also said that the notice period of 30 days has been reduced to 10 days in registration of mutation entries of disputed cases or those having certain conditions.

The release said that following the amendment, farmers, common citizens and property buyers will be freed from legal tangle and delay. It further said that the decision will make the revenue process more “transparent, timely and effective”.

In another decision, the government has given in-principle approval to amend the Bombay Prevention of Fragmentation and Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1947.

Quoting Vaghani, an official release said that those land parcels which came into existence in violation of the Act will be regularised without charging fine. All those transactions, it added, will be regularised and considered legal.

“So far, even after paying a fine of 10% of jantri (government fixed value of land), these transactions were not getting legalised and considered void. However, with this revolutionary amendment, thousands of bonafide purchasers’ land titles will be cleared and cases pending with revenue courts for years will be disposed of permanently,” the release said.

As per the release, the amendment will define the minimum area of a land parcel under the Act as 10 guntha (0.25 acre) across the state. In other words, there cannot be fragmentation of land beyond minimum 10 guntha in the state.