The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The new lag-thrams issued has many limitations or errors, but can be corrected within five years’ time, the Secretary of National Land Commission (NLC) said during the handing-taking of the land title certificate (thram) of Punakha on November 19.
Secretary Dasho Sangay Khandu mentioned that the new thrams might have mistakes such as, the name of the bearer due to mistyping of identity card number, map errors, and name of the location of the land.
Land Record Officer of Haa, Tshering Choden said there are no major mistakes with the new thram, but people who were not present during the final compilation of survey and the ones with land disputes were unable to get their thrams.
Land Record Officer of Trongsa, Dorji Pelzang said that the gewogs are in process of compiling report of the mistakes with regards to thrams.
According to the NLC, prior to the issue of the new thrams, the commission provided the provisional ownership certificate for availing loans, census transfers, house constructions, timber permit, and other land related services for those dzongkhags in which the new thrams are not issued. The NLC further notified that such certificates will not be provided to the people of Punakha as the new thrams are issued and the provisional certificates issued earlier shall remain null and invalid for the dzongkhag.
Pursuant to the Land Act 2007, from the date of new thrams issued by NLC, the name of the deceased landowner has to be deleted and records be transferred to a legitimate heir within 360 days, otherwise the land shall be reverted to State Reserved Forest land.
If there are any errors or mistakes in the new thram and map, the correction has to be processed and reported to NLC within five years from the date of issuance of a new thram.
It is also the responsibility of juristic individuals to pay the minimal land tax annually. If the landowner fails to pay for three consecutive years, the land will be reverted to State Forest Land as per the Land Act 2007.
The NLC Secretary mentioned that land issues can now be resolved at the dzongkhag headquarters. Earlier, records of thrams were maintained with the Commission who also resolved the issues. He believes that such provision will enable to ease about 90% of land related cases, adding that half of the cases in court are land related.
The Secretary also mentioned about land related problems mostly prevalent in Punakha and Paro, to date whereby landowners have improper demarcation of boundary, footpath, and irrigation and mule tracks. He urged the dzongkhag and gewog officials to resolve it as soon as possible.
NLC has hand over a total of 8,417 lag-thrams to dzongkhag officials till date, in 11 gewogs across the country.
The commission has handed thrams to ten dzongkhags that includes Mongar, Lhuentse, Trashiyangtse, Bumthang, Wangduephodrang, Haa, Dagana, 5 Gewogs in Trashigang and Punakha.
