The villages that went missing are located in the erstwhile Adilabad, Khammam, Warangal, Karimnagar, Rangareddy, Mahbubnagar and Medak districts.
Hyderabad: The Union ministry of home affairs and Directorate of Census for Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, during the pre-Census exercise, have found that 460 villages and two towns in Telangana have gone missing.
The Centre and the directorate reportedly came across this discrepancy when they were going through the 2011 Census data.
As reported by the Times of India, the 460 villages which were identified as missing are part of 14 newly-created districts, which were carved out in October 2016 when the TRS government rejigged the district map of the state.
Sending a missive to the Telangana government on the missing villages, the directorate has sought a clarification. The report added that the villages that went missing are located in the erstwhile Adilabad, Khammam, Warangal, Karimnagar, Rangareddy, Mahbubnagar and Medak districts. Mahbubnagar and Rangareddy districts are said to have the maximum number of missing villages. Besides 460 villages, two towns – Gadwal and Wanaparthy – are also missing.
Explaining the technical aspect of the situation, an official informed that though these villages in 58 mandals have been receiving benefits of government schemes, but technically, they cannot be treated as revenue villages since their names don’t exist in the GOs issued by the government.
A top revenue official has admitted lapses on part of the officials during the reorganisation exercise. Senior officials blamed district revenue officers for omitting the names due to confusion over contours of mandal and village borders. A senior official pointed out that the missing names have been mainly found in the reorganised mandals.