Land documents damaged at Pirojpur registrar's office

People requiring copies of their land documents from Pirojpur district registrar's (DR) office face untold suffering as a large portion of the balam (register) books and index books of the documents there are damaged beyond recognition.

After construction of the new DR office building at Pirojpur district headquarters in 2013, the land documents of the district were brought there from the registrar's office in Barisal in 2014 to ease land document collection for the people of Pirojpur, DR office sources said.

Over three lakh balam books and around 1.5 lakh index books from 1901 till date were brought to Pirojpur DR office from Barisal registrar's office, they said.

Among them, over 25 percent of balam books and 20 percent of index books have been damaged badly.

Especially the books from 1901 to 1970 are in awful condition.

Searchers at the office often fail to find out the documents for their clients as most of the books, especially index books, are damaged.

"For over two months, I am trying to find out my land documents from the year 1953-1957 but in vain. The searcher has said the index books of these years are damaged," said Sachin Sikder of Goalbuniya village under Mathbaria upazila in Pirojpur.

"As I faced a dispute over my land, I came to the DR office to collect my old land documents from the year 1948-1955. I came to this office eight times in two months but I have failed to get them. The searcher could not find out my name from the badly damaged index books," said Md Habibur Rahman, who came from Sapleza village of Mathbaria upazila.

"As most of the index books are damaged we often fail to find out the clients' land documents even in urgent situations," said Moniruzzaman Masum, a searcher at Pirojpur DR office.

The balam books and index books need binding on an urgent basis to save them from further damage, said several workers of the office.

Admitting that the balam books and index books of the office are in very bad conditions, Achinta Kumar Saha, DR of Pirojpur, said, "We have demanded fund to the higher authority so that we can start binding the documents."