CBEC creates Geography!
Where is Thawachpuri?
While bureaucrats would like to create history by their extraordinary performance, our Revenue Boards seem to be creating Geography! According to CBEC and CBDT if somebody wants to set up an industry in the non industrial area in the village of Thawachpuri existing in the tehsil of Bazpur, Udhamsingh nagar District , State of Uttranchal he is entitled to exemption under central excise notification 50/2003 dated 10.6.2003 and income tax exemption under 177/2004 dated 28.6.2004.
But the catch is Thawachpuri simply does not exist in the map. Industrialists wanting to avail this exemption have been searching for this elusive village in the net and maps to start their industries, but found their efforts futile. For love or money nobody could tell them where this blasted village is.
Where did our Revenue Boards get this village from? Obviously the state government, but the District Industries Centre of Udhamsingh Nagar had written to the State Government and the Centre more than three years ago that the village does not exist and it was a mistake but nobody had bothered to correct it so far.
These notifications have a lot of fiscal value for the real estate around the notified area suddenly turns into gold and it seems that the mighty ones of the land including the Chief Ministers sit with the TRU officers to ensure that the places are correctly notified.
These alchemic notifications being so important, it is surprising that non existent villages figure in them. It certainly can’t be the mistake of the North Block, for how will any one sitting in North Block know what and where Thawachpuri is?
But why is the mistake not corrected even after three years and even though the DIC has pointed out the mistake? Is it that somebody is yet to buy land near the non existent Thawachpuri?