Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday extended the deadline for the self-declaration of landholdings under the ongoing Bihar Special Survey and Settlement by 180 working days.

People will now be able to “self-declare” their landholdings in the rural areas till March 2025 to the revenue and land reforms department officials in person or online through its designated website.

The decision was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Kumar and came as a huge relief to the landholders who have been running from pillar to post to gather details and documents related to their land in an attempt to be a part of the survey.

Only around 75 lakh self-declarations have been filed so far, while the department, going by the land records, is expecting around 3.5 crore self-declarations.

“The cabinet approved the Bihar Special Survey and Settlement (Amendment) Rules, 2024, to ensure 100 per cent transparency and smoothness in the survey and settlement work. The ryots (landholders) have been given 180 days to submit their declarations,” cabinet secretariat department additional chief secretary S. Siddharth told reporters.

Revenue and land reforms department additional chief secretary, Dipak Kumar Singh, pointed out that the previous deadline for self-declaration was 30 days from the date of survey notification in the respective areas or villages and had lapsed sometime in September. He added that the notification of the survey was complete at all panchayats in the state by August 20.

“The people were distressed due to the unavailability of land records and were continuously requesting to extend the deadline for self-declaration. The decision to extend it has been taken with the hope that they will be able to arrange their documents and participate in the survey in increasing numbers,” Singh said.

“Since the survey notification was done everywhere in the state by August 20, the 180 working days will be over around March 25. It should be considered as the new deadline,” Singh added.

The land survey will cover around 45,000 revenue villages in Bihar. The previous main survey — the Cadastral Survey — in the state was done between 1890 and 1920 during the British period. It was followed by a partial “revisional survey”, which started in some districts around 80 years ago.