PESHAWAR, Aug 28: Revenue record as old as dating back to 1870 has been partially damaged in recent floods in Nowshera district, Dawn reliably learnt on Saturday.

Widespread rains and subsequent floods since July 28 submerged roads, government buildings and houses. Floods also caused damage to the record of the revenue office, Nowshera, official sources said.

“Problems may occur if any record of land rights is found missing or damaged in the floods,” said one of the officials. He said that although the revenue office had the copy of the record, but vested interests could exploit the situation and there might be litigations concerning land issues.

According to official data, Nowshera comprised 159 mozas (villages), of which 103 Jamah Bandis ( periodicals), including record as old as of 1870, were partially damaged, while 52 periodicals were safe. In Pabbi tehsil alone there were 52 mozas and all of them were partially damaged, the sources said.

“We will have to work hard to repair and improve the partially damaged record and we hope to complete the task well in time,” said an official.

Experts on the subject said that reforms must be made for computerization of revenue record and simplification of procedures for covering the ground level information. Sources said that Mughal era terminologies and procedures were still used in the revenue record that needed simplification.

Under the law, there should be land settlement after every 20 years, but in Peshawar division no such operation has been conducted in the last 80 years. This has resulted in land issues and litigation which in some cases linger on for decades.