Will implement smart land services as a team: Land minister 

The Ministry of Land will work as a team to implement smart land management, newly-appointed Land Minister Narayan Chandra Chanda said today.

"All of us working in the ministry and its offices and agencies will work as a team to implement smart land management, which is a part of the prime minister's planned manifesto," the minister said at the Secretariat this morning. 

The minister said, "We want the support of all stakeholders to implement smart land services. Every person of Bangladesh is directly and indirectly involved with the land, so there is no alternative to citizen participation to build sustainable and smart land management."

Terming the land ministry as a 'challenging' ministry, he said, "We will review the plans and check how the prime minister's plans can be implemented quickly and sustainably and then will work accordingly."

Appreciating the leadership of former land minister Saifuzzaman Chowdhury in implementing the digitization of land services and formulating important new laws related to land, the new land minister said he took forward the work of digitization of land services. 

"We will continue to carry forward the progress he has made," he added.

Addressing the journalists, he said, "If there are irregularities anywhere, please highlight it, if there is good work, highlight it too. We need your cooperation; it will speed up our work."

Asked about harassment in the land office, the minister said, "We will be strict against any kind of citizen harassment. Besides, we are planning digitization in such a way that the system does not allow harassment."

In response to another question related to corruption, the land minister said, "I, myself, will work in a clean way. I hope that all my colleagues working in the Ministry of Land and all the departments and organisations under its purview will work in the same way. If they fail, they will be prosecuted as per the law."

Land Secretary Md Khalilur Rahman was present at the time.

Among others, Chairman of Land Appeal Board AKM Shamimul Haque, Chairman of Land Reform Board Md. Abdus Sabur Mondal, Director General of Land Record and Survey Department Anis Mahmud, all Additional Secretaries of the Ministry of Land and various level officials and employees were also present in the meeting.