Secunderabad Cantonment Board resumes digitisation of land records

The Secunderabad Cantonment Board has restarted digitisation of records after 10 years. Over 20,000 files will be scanned to preserve defence land data, improve access, and reduce disputes. The project is expected to be completed within six months.

Hyderabad: For the second time, the Secunderabad Cantonment has decided to take up an exercise to digitise the records, documents, maps and Board resolutions. The last digitisation of records, including maps and drawings, was carried out in 2015 and after a gap of 10 years, the process has now started again in Secunderabad Cantonment.

A senior SCB official said the SCB completed the first phase of the digitisation process with the consent of the Ministry of Defence and has now decided on its own to digitise the remaining years of records.

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The digitisation matter came to discussion as one of the agenda items in the Cantonment Board meeting held in February, where the members were informed about the project by the SCB chief executive officer, Arvind Kumar Dwivedi. The CEO explained to the Board that tenders were floated and out of four, one bidder has been qualified. The bidder, Thrinaina Informatics Pvt Limited, quoted Rs 10.40 lakh for digitising over 8 lakh pages.

The CEO also stated that from 2015 onwards, a substantial number of files, approximately 20,000 files, remain un-digitised, of which 5,300 were building plans, 12,800 were assessment/mutation files and other miscellaneous files.

When president, Cantonment Board Brigadier, S Rajeev, who chaired the Board meeting, enquired about timeframe for completion of digitisation and scanning work, the CEO stated that the bidder has to complete the process within six months and would be extended for the additional time as scanning large maps and drawings takes more time.

Regarding the benefits of the exercise, a senior SCB official told ‘Telangana Today’ that digitisation of records would ensure preservation of precious defence land records for a long time and ensure their easy retrieval by the users. The digitisation also aims to protect against land disputes, especially in the context of identifying and auditing land in the 40 sq km Cantonment area.

Meanwhile, scanning of physical records and digitisation is being carried out at a brisk pace at SCB’s record room located within the Cantonment Board office.