1,141 burial grounds encroached upon: State to Karnataka HC

The government on Tuesday submitted before the High Court of Karnataka that 1,141 burial grounds have been encroached upon.

The government on Tuesday submitted before the High Court of Karnataka that 1,141 burial grounds have been encroached upon. Of these, 282 encroachments have been removed and 859 encroachments yet to be cleared.

A Karnataka high court order in 2019 directed the state to provide graveyards in all villages of the state in six weeks. (AFP)

A Division Bench of Justice B Veerappa and Justice K S Hamsakala was hearing a civil contempt petition filed by a resident of Bengaluru Mohammed Iqbal.

The contempt plea alleged the State had failed to follow an order of the High Court issued in 2019 to provide graveyards in all villages of the State in six weeks.

The court on August 16 said encroachments should be removed and villages without graveyards be provided with one by three weeks. The compliance report of the Revenue Department was submitted to the court today.

A total of 23,815 burial grounds have been handed over to local authorities. Another 3,765 have to be handed over, the report says.

The process of identifying, purchase, reserving and granting land for burial grounds in 516 places is underway, according to the compliance report.

The report says 92 per cent of the villages have been provided with burial grounds and only in a few cases there has been a delay due to legal issues.

Following the submission that three more weeks were required to comply with the directive of the court, the Bench adjourned the hearing by three weeks.