LIS in India - Perspective and restrospective

LIS in India - Perspective and restrospective

Brig. M. Gopal Rao
Director
Digital Mapping Centre, Survey of India
Telephone: 040-7200430, Fax: 040-7200430
dmchdsoi@hd2.dot.net.in

Introduction
Man, Land and the Natural Resources supported by the land, always had an intrinsic and dynamic relationship. History shows us that early civilizations flourished wherever the natural resources were in plenty to sustain the needs of its people. Any tilt in the balance of the ecosystems generally led to the decadence of these early civilizations. It is perhaps on account of this, that our ancient Indian thinkers and Philosophers, emphasised the symbiotic and intrinsic relationship which exists between man and land, with land here being taken in its broader all encompassing view, including all the natural resources and living beings. They thus tried to describe the complex and interactive support role played by the various eco-subsystems for sustenance of the environment.

Through the ages, land thus played a pivotal role in shaping the fortunes of human beings. In the pre-Industrial Revolution era, when agriculture was the principal source of revenue, land served as a symbol of status and wealth. However, the dawn of the industrial age saw a paradigm shift in man's relationship with land. Land and land supported resources were increasingly viewed as a commodity for meeting the needs of industry and industrial inputs. This, coupled with the heavy pressure on land, by the ever increasing population, led to over exploitation of land resources, leading to irreparable damage to the eco-systems and depletion of life supporting natural resources. The scale and magnitude of this man made disaster reached such alarming proportions, that it prompted the United Nations to convene a Conference of the world nations, to discuss the urgent issues relating to Environment and Development.

The earth summit:
The Earth Summit, which was held in Rio de Janeiro from 3rd to 14th June 1992 enunciated twenty seven principles to guide National conduct on environmental protection and development. The very first principle reads, "Human beings are at the center of concerns for sustainable development. They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature". It thus brings into focus the pivotal role of human beings in any sustainable development effort and at the same time the need to sustain the ecological balance in nature. The other principles reiterate, amongst other issues, the States' sovereign rights to exploit its resources without detriment to the environment, as also the need to curb unsustainable patterns of production and consumption. Three of these principles are, relevant to the concerns of third world and developing countries, such as India, and they are Principles 3, 4 and 5.

Principle 3, "The right to development must be fulfilled so as to equitably meet the development and environmental needs of present and future generations".

Principle 4, "In order to achieve sustainable development, environmental protection shall constitute an integral part of the development process and cannot be considered in isolation from it".

Principle 5, "All States and all people shall cooperate in the essential task of eradicating poverty as an indispensable requirement for sustainable development in order to decrease the disparities in standards of living and better meet the needs of the majority of the people of the world".

The Earth Summit also formulated another important document "Agenda 21" which presents the detailed work plans for sustainable development. The first section of this document deals with Social and Economic issues including the need to eradicate poverty and hunger and to accelerate sustainable development in Developing Countries. The second section, covers issues concerning Conservation and Management of Resources for Development, in which Chapter 10, deals with Integrated Planning and Management of Land Resources and high lights the need to allocate land to uses that provide the greatest sustainable benefits. The third section deals with the role and importance of major groups in implementing the sustainable development and the fourth section discusses issues relating to means of implementation in which the last chapter, chapter 40, deals with Information for Decision Making, where in the importance of collecting and using information for sustainable development and for implementing Agenda 21 is high lighted. Agenda 21 also requires creation of efficient and accessible land markets to meet community requirements, streamlining land transaction procedures by improving land registry systems and to establish appropriate land tenure to provide security to all land users.

Agenda 21, though legally not binding, became a moral commitment for all the nations to work towards achieving the objectives of the Earth Summit. Thus any action plan for developing a Land Information System, should be within the frame work of providing a decision support system for achieving sustainable development as enunciated in Agenda 21 of the Earth Summit. However, before discussing issues relating to requirements to be met by a National LIS, it will be pertinent to briefly recall India's developmental efforts over the last five decades and analyse the results.

India's development strategies in past:
At the dawn of Indian Independence, India was beset with problems of poverty, lack of basic infrastructure facilities and inadequate resources. The country, therefore opted for a state controlled planned economy to optimise its scarce resources, for achieving a basic minimum standard in respect of essentials of physical and social well being for its people. The Planning Commission laid emphasis on creation of basic infrastructure for industrial, agricultural and scientific growth. Realising the importance of upto-date land records, the planners emphasised the need for well maintained land records for good administration even from the First Five Year Plan. The early plans which followed the Top-Down approach, failed to fully meet their stated objectives as the plans generated at the macro-level did not realistically address the geo-physical and socio-economic variations at the regional level. In the later plans, the planning process was decentralised so as to make them more area specific. The Government also launched direct attack on poverty and unemployment by introducing schemes for providing gainful employment to the land less and unemployed poor in the rural areas.

As a result of all these plan programmes and initiatives, many heavy industries, institutes of higher learning and Research Laboratories were established. Number of large and medium size irrigation projects were started and through the Green Revolution, the country was able to achieve self sufficiency on the food front. The country today stands in the forefront in many fields of scientific research and is the acknowledged leader in the field of Information Technology. India has the largest Technical manpower and ranks amongst the front runners in space research.

In as much as all the foregoing appears impressive, the stark reality of the situation is that there is a perceptible gap between the stated goals and achievements. In absolute terms, the number of people below poverty line has increased. The dream of universal education is still a far cry. Many villages even today lack proper approach roads and many villages do not have easy access to safe drinking water. Health facilities are concentrated in and around urban areas where only quarter of the country's population resides. The country needs another Green Revolution to meet the future food requirement, as the annual growth of agriculture is not adequate to meet the needs of the estimated 1.3 billion population by the year 2030. Lack of adequate employment opportunities in the rural areas coupled with, almost cyclic and frequent occurrences of floods and droughts leading to crop failures are forcing marginal farmers and land less poor to migrate to urban areas, thus putting a heavy strain on the already over-stretched infra-structure facilities of towns and cities. In many instances, projects and industries set up for a particular purpose have ostensibly achieved their objective, but have adversely affected in other ways as the environmental impact of these industries and projects had not been properly studied. We therefore hear of many industries being ordered to shut down or shift, leading to further unemployment. Another interesting example is the recent havoc wrought by floods in Hyderabad due to the city's improvement and beautification schemes being taken up without proper environmental impact studies and also the unnoticed encroachments on lake beds and river beds.

Thus all this calls for a close hard look at the Planning concepts in the past so as to chalk out a strategy for sustainable development in the future. An underlying cause for most of the aforestated short comings, is lack of authentic and upto-date information, be it about the beneficiary groups, existing facilities, terrain and soil conditions or land ownership and occupancy position. The planners were therefore, severely, handicapped for want of information. Hence there is an urgent need to establish a reliable information system, as envisaged in 'Agenda 21', to achieve environmentally sustainable development.

Information System for Sustainable development:
The factors governing sustainable development will vary from country to country, depending on the needs and conditions prevalent therein. Hence a sustainable development model applicable in a developed country may not be suitable model for developing and less developed nations. In India, where three fourths of the population lives in rural areas, a large proportion of whom are dependent on agriculture, any strategy for sustainable development should have agriculture and agro industries as the primary underlying theme. It should also take into consideration the fact that majority of the agriculturists are marginal farmers with low levels of resilience to factors having adverse impact on agriculture. ( The plight of these farmers will get further accentuated if the WTO stipulations for withdrawal of all subsidies is to be implemented.) The development plans will have to therefore focus on improving land management and introducing sustainable agricultural practices to increase productivity on one hand, and on the other, on improving the rural infrastructure for agricultural production, processing and marketing.

There are today number of agencies engaged in collection of data pertaining to such items as physical features of land, natural resources, man-made features, environmental conditions and socioeconomic factors. A resource called INFORMATION is extracted from this data which is useful for planning and development. With the advent of computers it has become possible to relate this information content to its geographic position which has brought about the concept of Geographic Information System.

Geographic Information System (GIS) is defined as a collection of data, storage and analysis with relation to their spatial distribution at various stages of information handling. When the data in the GIS is related to various quantitative and qualitative aspects of land resource, it is termed as Land Information System (LIS).

The definition of LIS implies that the spatially referenced land data stored in the database should be related to its ground location. In the Indian context of an information system for sustainable development the obvious choice of geographical location is the land parcel available in cadastral records. It is both easily locatable on a map and described in legal records. Such a land information system generated from the cadastral surveys will provide the information base for village level or micro level planning. The LIS will comprise of graphic elements derived from cadastral maps and non-graphic attribute data obtained from cadastral records suitably supplemented with additional information useful for planning purposes.

In rural development, plans are formulated at various levels and the data requirement at each level of planning is different, hence information systems should be designed for each level of decision making and planning. The higher level information systems can be derived by aggregation of village level LIS's through a process of generalisation of the graphic elements and filtering and supplementing of attribute information.

Current status of Land records and LIS in India:
The present cadastral system was evolved by the British for purposes of governance and revenue collection and till 1905 the responsibility for revenue surveys was with Survey of India. There after the responsibility was transferred to the Provinces and now vests with the State Governments. The cadastral maps were required to be updated every 30 years. However, as most of the states have not carried out any survey and settlement operations since independence, the land records are by and large out dated and do not reflect the ground realities with regard to ownership and possession. The accuracy of the original cadastral surveys, which were carried out based on the technology and accuracy standards relevant at that time, are wholly inadequate now due to rapid fragmentation of land parcels coupled with the rising land prices. The legal cover for the land owners is provided through a sale deed on stamp paper which becomes a legal document which can be invoked at the time of disputes and litigation. However it does not necessarily provide the guarantee to title.

Recognising the importance of land records and realising the deficiencies in the cadastral system, the planners advocated proper maintenance of land records as the basis for good administration in First Five Year Plan and subsequently in the Second and Third Plans also. The Sixth Plan laid down a target of five years from 1980-1985 for compilation and updating of land records. The Seventh Plan while re-emphasising the need for updated land records also advocated scientific survey of unmeasured lands. Towards achieving these objectives, few pilot projects were taken up using various technologies for generating Cadastral maps. Computerisation of land records was started under a centrally sponsored scheme in Seventh Plan which continued through the Eighth and Ninth Plans.

With regard to Land Information System, there is no computer based LIS operational in the country. However, the cadastral records in their present form could be vaguely construed as a conventional Land Information System. As the land records have been created with a village as an administrative unit, such an LIS could be treated as a village level LIS comprising of two distinctive components - the graphical record comprising of field measurements and sketches and the descriptive land register in which the title and other land related information is recorded. However, such a conventional LIS has very limited utility for planners on account of the inaccuracies which have crept into the system and also the limitation on the quantum of attribute data it contained. Further the access to information was limited to only those who held the records.

Need for a hierarchical model of information system:
For a country like India with its rural based economy largely dependent on agriculture, the most suitable model for an LIS is one in which the data is referenced to the Land parcel fully described in the cadastral records. Such village-LIS will be useful for micro level planning as it can contain all information, both graphic and non graphic pertinent to the village planning requirements. The graphic database will store all data relating to graphic elements which describe the limits of parcels, its adjacency and other feature information. The non-graphic database, apart from containing information available in the land registry records can also include other attribute data such as house hold, cultural, socio-economic data etc. which would be relevant for planners at village level.

Since, in rural development planning, plans need to be formulated at different levels of administrative hierarchy, the next logical stage for planning is the Mandal or the Tahsil. Here the issues addressed by the planners will pertain to the developmental needs of a group of villages and so their data requirements will also vary. These plans will no longer be addressing each individual land holding or holder. It will instead look at the needs of a group of contiguous villages or a larger area of land with identified common requirements such as all lands falling in a catchment area etc. An LIS for Tahsil planners could therefore be generated from the village - LIS by filtering and integrating the graphic elements and generalising and aggregating the non-graphic attribute data. The data in this LIS could therefore be spatially referenced not to the individual parcel or holding but to a grouping of parcels, e.g. area covered by a Revenue Survey number. The non-graphic land data will also therefore cover the common land attributes of the grouping and in addition any other land data which will be relevant for planning at this level. Similarly for other attribute data, it will no longer cover the individual house holds but a larger homogenous grouping with a common socio-economic or ethnic denominator. The information stored in the database will therefore be classed or grouped data.

These two levels of planning, the village and Tahsil level constitute the micro level where in the geo-specific local variation in physical and socio-economic factors can be effectively addressed. The next level of hierarchical plan formulation could be at District level. At this level the issues to be addressed will be more broad-based like planning for infrastructure facilities like communications network, power, higher levels of medical needs etc. which constitute elements of macro level planning. The data requirements at this level will therefore be of a vastly different nature. Here the data in the database needs to be referenced to the villages and towns, e.g. development of road networks, infrastructure, marketing facilities etc. will be with reference to habitations. The Survey of India topographic maps on 1:25,000 in which the village boundaries and municipal boundaries are depicted, could serve as ideal base maps for generating the GIS at District Level. As the Tahsil level LIS's contain the village boundaries, it will be possible to aggregate the non-graphic attribute data village wise in the LIS and map it into the District GIS. Here also, all the data in the Tahsil LIS's will not be required, hence only the relevant information will need to be aggregated. In addition to this, any other information as necessary for the district level of planning can also be incorporated in the databases.

Such a Hierarchical design of information systems will ensure that plans generated at all levels will be compatible as they will be based on information derived from a common source. It will also reduce redundancy in storage and eliminate duplication of efforts at data capturing stage.

Base Map Requirement And Need For Modernising Cadastral Surveys
It is needless to say that an accurate map is a basic requisite to design an LIS. It is also desirable that these maps are on some standard scales and with accuracy standards commensurate with present day requirements. The projection system for these maps should be such that it facilitates seamless integration of map data when generating maps for higher level information systems. The present day cadastral maps, when viewed in the context of these requirements, are wholly inadequate and unsuitable for generation of the LIS for reasons as follows -

There are no common standard scales being followed. It differs from state to state and varies from 1:500 to 1:5000 .

The accuracy standards also differ from state to state and are not adequate for present day requirements as the survey techniques and standards being followed are generally those adopted over 100 years ago .

The village maps are generally very old and either need heavy updating or have gone through various stages of manual settlement resulting in degradation of quality.

The projection used in India is Cassini projection in which the scale is true along the central Meridian and in a direction at right angles to it. However the scale along the other meridians is exaggerated as we go away from the central meridian. Hence the projection is suitable only for areas having small extent in East-West directions. This therefore renders it unsuitable for larger areas and for seamless integration of maps.

These surveys also do not have height information which is very important for micro watershed development planning, a key requirement for land management and agricultural development.

Thus there is an urgent need to modernise the cadastral surveying techniques and to update the cadastral records if they are to meet the requirements of the LIS. For this, the following issues need to be addressed -

Scale of Base Map.
Choice of projection for Base Map.
Surveying Techniques for Base Map Survey.

Scale of Base Map - Normally the factors which determine the scale of surveying are accuracy requirements, size of parcels and land value. Urban and semi-urban areas, where the land value is high and plot / parcel sizes are small, will require higher measurement accuracy and larger scale mapping. For sparsely populated areas, where the parcel sites are generally larger and land value lower, a smaller scale survey would suffice. Hence, it is suggested that three scales be adopted for cadastral surveying -

1:500 for urban / semi-urban areas with high land value
1:1000 for rural areas where the parcel sizes are small and land value is high
1:2000 for rural areas where the parcel sizes are bigger and land value is lower

The suggested scale for Tahsil -LIS is 1:10,000. This could be either directly surveyed or compiled from the cadastral maps.

Choice of Projection for Base Map - A common projection system will not only facilitate ease of merger of adjacent sheets but also upward integration of graphic elements from Village level to Tahsil level and District level - an essential pre-requisite for the hierarchical LIS to evolve to GIS. Ideally a projection should satisfy three principal cartographic criteria -

Conformality� correct representation of shapes.
Equidistance � correct representation of distances
Equivalency �. Correct representation of areas.

In practice no single map projection satisfies all these three properties. Hence for any particular mapping requirement, a projection should be so selected that these properties are satisfied within permissible limits. Three most commonly used projections are Polyconic projection, Lambert orthomorphic conical projection and Transverse Mercator projection. It is therefore, desirable that cadastral mapping should switch over to a more versatile conformal projection like Lambert conical or Transverse Mercator as the present Cassini projection is not suitable.

The existing Cadastral survey practices have been in vogue for more than 100 years with accuracy standards, which will not satisfy present day requirements. Hence it is imperative that better and improved techniques of survey are adopted. Survey of India had carried out a pilot project in Orissa for Angul Nalco Project in which Analogue photogrammetric instruments fitted with encoders were used to capture 3-D data digitally. The results achieved were consistent with the accuracy requirements and could be used. The other option which could be considered are -

Use of GPS and Total station.
Use of Soft Copy Photogrammetric work station with scanned aerial photography.
Plotting on analogue photogrammetric instrument and digitizing the photogrammetric plotted section.

These techniques are capable of giving accuracy commensurate with the cadastral survey requirements and the output generated is in the digital form which could be used directly in the LIS. In the first two methods, the third dimension height gets automatically recorded whereas in the third method, the photogrammetric plot which is generated is a 2-D plot, hence in digitisation the data is captured in 2-D mode. However, through the process of tagging heights to contours, during digitisation, and interpolation the third element, height, can be incorporated.

Need for Mission Mode Approach for Generating LIS
The task of carrying out fresh surveys for cadastral mapping is both time consuming and needs a large commitment of manpower and equipment which are not available with the State Governments. Earlier only Survey of India and few other Government departments had the expertise for carrying out these surveys, but even for them, it will not be possible to complete this task in a short time. Fortunately, today we also find many agencies in private sector who have developed the expertise and technological capabilities to participate in this mission. It is therefore important that the various Central Government departments, State Governments and agencies in private sector join hands to complete the cadastral re-survey in a time bound manner so as to put in place the base maps for developing the LIS.

Another important aspect which needs to be addressed is the task of collecting and collating large amounts of data which will form the information base of the LIS. There are today a number of agencies, both in Government and Private sectors, which are engaged in collection of information in the field. The quality of the data being collected and its interpretation differs from organisation to organisation, depending on the aim and objectives of that organisation. We therefore find the same data available from multiple sources but inconsistent amongst themselves. There is therefore an urgent necessity for formulating the meta data standards for data collection and also coordinating the efforts of all these organisations. This will ensure the quality and integrity of input data and also prevent wasteful duplication of efforts.

As all this involves coordinating the efforts of many agencies and departments, it is imperative that the task is taken up as a National Mission. Such National Mission approach will result in synthesis of technologies, pooling of expertise and optimisation of resources. Most importantly it will also ensure channelisation of all efforts towards speedy development of the LIS.

Advantages of A National LIS
There are many advantages which will accrue from such an LIS. First and foremost it will provide the planners and administrators with a reliable information source for both generation of development plans and also monitoring the progress. The planners can adopt modern management decision making tools such as Analytical Hierarchical Process and Scenario Planning to evaluate various developmental plans and their impact so as to arrive at the optimal development strategy. This will go a long way in meeting the nation's commitment at the Earth Summit to adopt sustainable development and protect the environment.

Another important area in which the LIS could be of immense value is in implementing land reforms and land consolidation. The importance of these measures has been stressed repeatedly by the Planning Commission, but with very little impact. The distribution of surplus lands will help the landless poor and marginal farmers with an improved means of livelihood. Through land consolidation, it will be possible to aggregate the fragmented individual holdings of the farmers into one economically viable parcel. Another benefit which will accrue from this is the possibility of allocating land for common community uses through proportional deduction from each individual holder. In the process of consolidation and resurvey, the Government could also think of switching over to registration of tittle to the owner as envisaged in Agenda 21 of the Earth Summit. This apart from guaranteeing ownership rights will also go a long way in reducing land related disputes and litigations.

Networking of these LISs and GISs through statewide networks will further enhance the utility of the information system. Any changes made at the grass-root level can be easily reflected in the higher level information systems. It will also be possible to provide ready access to information to various users and agencies, the principle enshrined in the Earth Summit declaration and also in the Right to Information Bill.

Conclusion:
India has come a long way since Independence in developing the basic infrastructure which was relevant in the context of the state controlled economy. With the old order giving way to new economic order, globalisation of the Indian economy is inevitable and infact the process has already set in. If the Indian poor are to survive in the free market era, it is imperative that the country improves its infrastructure and strengthens its economy in the transition period to the free economy. In the process it should also be ensured that sustainable practices are introduced for environmental protection. Hence, the need of the hour is to develop a coordinated approach to planning for which an efficient and reliable information system is essential. Fortunately the expertise is available and the urgency is well recognised and a number of agencies are already engaged in building up the databases and Information Systems. Hence, this is the opportune time to establish a National Level Mission for creation of a National LIS, so as to channelise the ongoing efforts to avoid wasteful duplication and also impart a sense of urgency for its development.