As Central Gujarat continues to emerge as a major hub for industry, infrastructure and urban expansion, efficient land governance has become increasingly important. The Revenue Department is leveraging digital technologies, integrated databases and geospatial tools to improve transparency, streamline service delivery and facilitate responsible development.
Dr. Jayanti S. Ravi, IAS, Additional Chief Secretary, Revenue Department, Government of Gujarat, in this exclusive interview with Abhineet Kumar & Elma Fatima of Elets News Network, explains how these initiatives are supporting investment, enhancing citizen services, and shaping the future of revenue administration in Gujarat.
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Q1. Gujarat has been a pioneer in modernising land administration systems. How is the Revenue Department leveraging technologies such as GIS mapping, digital land records, and integrated databases to enhance transparency and improve citizen services?
I believe the biggest transformation is that technology is no longer just digitising government; it is transforming governance itself.
For many years, land administration consisted of independent processes—land records, registration, surveys, revenue courts, and citizen services all functioned separately. Our effort has been to bring these together into one integrated digital ecosystem, so that information flows seamlessly instead of citizens having to repeatedly navigate different offices and systems. The next milestone in this journey is the Integrated Land Administration (ILA). ILA is envisioned as a unified digital backbone that will seamlessly integrate land records, registration, surveys, GIS, revenue courts, and citizen services into a single interoperable ecosystem. Rather than functioning as separate applications, these systems will increasingly work together through trusted data and common digital workflows.
Today, over 1.22 crore Records of Rights have been computerised and allotted UPIN (Unique Property Identification Number) to each, while AnyRoR records nearly 1.9 crore online views every month and around 2 lakh authenticated downloads, reflecting both transparency and public trust. Through iORA, we process more than 54,000 online applications every month, including nearly 150 Non-Agriculture applications every day, making revenue services faster, more transparent, and completely trackable.
On the geospatial side, nearly 92 lakh land parcels have already been assigned Unique Land Parcel Identification Numbers (ULPINs). This creates the foundation for GIS-enabled governance, enabling authenticated parcel identification, better planning, improved government land management, and evidence-based decision-making.
Going forward, our vision is much larger than digitalisation. We are building a Digital Public Infrastructure for land, where records, maps, registrations, courts, and citizen services function as one trusted ecosystem. Ultimately, technology should make governance simpler for citizens and smarter for the government.
Q2. The Vibrant Gujarat Regional Conference highlights the unique strengths of different regions. From a land governance and administrative perspective, what opportunities do you see for unlocking the development potential of Central Gujarat?
Every region has its own development story. Central Gujarat’s strength lies in its diversity; it combines vibrant cities, globally competitive industries, fertile agriculture, leading educational institutions, healthcare infrastructure, and excellent connectivity within one region.
From the Revenue Department’s perspective, our responsibility is to ensure that land governance accelerates this growth rather than slow this. That means making land information transparent, ensuring timely land availability for public infrastructure and industry, enabling scientific land-use planning and reducing uncertainty through predictable, technology-enabled processes.
Today, investors look beyond land availability—they look for clarity, certainty and speed. Transparent records, integrated digital systems and coordinated administration help create exactly that confidence.
As Gujarat moves towards Viksit Bharat and Viksit Gujarat, I believe Central Gujarat has the potential to become a model where economic growth, sustainable planning and efficient land governance reinforce one another, creating long-term value for citizens as well as investors.
Q3. With rapid urbanisation and industrial expansion, balancing development with efficient land management is becoming increasingly important. How is the department ensuring sustainable and equitable land use planning across Gujarat?
Development and sustainability are often presented as competing priorities. I believe they are actually complementary. Sustainable development is only possible when land governance is scientific, transparent, and future-oriented.
Our approach therefore is to plan rather than respond later.
Technology certainly plays an important role through GIS mapping, digital land records and integrated databases. The mapping of nearly 92 lakh uniquely identified land parcels is enabling more scientific planning and better coordination across departments. But technology alone is never sufficient.
Equally important are our institutional safeguards that protect agricultural land, public land, environmentally sensitive areas and the legitimate rights of landholders while facilitating infrastructure and industrial development.
The objective is not merely to approve projects faster. It is to ensure that development is legally robust, environmentally responsible, and socially inclusive, so that Gujarat’s growth remains sustainable over the long term.
Q4. As Gujarat advances towards a digitally empowered and future-ready governance model, what is your vision for transforming revenue administration into a more responsive, transparent, and citizen-centric system over the next decade?
If I were to describe our vision in one sentence, I would say:
The best revenue administration is one that citizens hardly have to think about because services are simple, seamless, and trustworthy.
The next decade will not be about creating more digital applications—it will be about connecting the applications we already have into one intelligent ecosystem.
Our vision is to create a Digital Public Infrastructure for land, where land records, registration, surveys, GIS, revenue courts and citizen services operate through a single trusted data framework. Citizens should not have to submit the same information repeatedly, and government departments should not work with different versions of the same data.
Technologies such as AI, GIS analytics, drone surveys, and predictive monitoring will increasingly help us anticipate issues, reduce disputes, improve planning, and make decision-making more evidence-based.
But ultimately, technology is only the means. The real objective is to build a Revenue Department that is transparent, trusted, responsive, and citizen-centric, while supporting investment, ease of living, and sustainable development across Gujarat.
Our larger aspiration is to make ‘Ease of Access to Revenue Services’ a defining principle of the Revenue Department. Just as we speak of Ease of Doing Business, citizens should also experience ease in accessing the government. Whether someone is applying for a service, accessing a land record, registering a property, or resolving a land-related issue, the process should be simple, transparent, time-bound, and largely digital. Ultimately, technology succeeds only when governance becomes more accessible, more responsive, and more trustworthy for every citizen and every investor.
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Q5. How can stronger coordination between government departments, industry stakeholders, and local administrations help create a more efficient framework for land availability and project implementation in Central Gujarat?
If there is one lesson we have learnt over the years, it is that successful projects are built on institutional coordination rather than individual departmental efficiency.
Land availability today is not only a revenue matter. It involves planning authorities, urban development agencies, industries, infrastructure providers, environmental agencies, district administrations and local bodies. When these institutions work with different information, delays are inevitable.
Our effort therefore is to ensure that all stakeholders increasingly work from the same authenticated digital information, enabling faster decisions, better planning and more efficient utilisation of land. District Collectors play a pivotal role in bringing different agencies together at the field level, while continuous engagement with industry helps government understand evolving requirements and respond proactively.
Ultimately, stronger coordination creates greater investor confidence, quicker project implementation, better utilisation of public resources and improved outcomes for citizens. In many ways, that collaborative approach has become one of the defining strengths of Gujarat’s governance model.