Survey Of India Begins Cartographic Exercise: India To Have 100 Times More Detailed High-Resolution Maps

Survey of India (SoI) will carry out its high-resolution cartographic exercise, this is first update in 16 years.

By the end of June, six states, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttarakhand will have 100 times more sophisticated and detailed maps than existing ones, and at the end of the year SoI aims to conclude maps for three more states, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.

Operations to survey have already begun, with about 23,000 villages having been covered. This project will eventually cover all states, but timelines have been hard to predict due to Covid-induced gaps, The Times of India quoted Surveyor General of India Lt Gen Girish Kumar (retired), person in-charge of project, as saying.

Last topographical exercise was conducted in 2005. Slightly old data is being used by all organisations such as National Highways Authority of India, defence, Archaeological Survey of India and Census of India, and the new update on topography is important, as it will help address inter-state issues, rural property rights, urban planning, flood forecasting, public asset and natural resource management, an SoI official said.

This will result in high resolution maps that will show everything from houses to office buildings, and small landmarks in remote villages, the official said. This information can be used in land disputes, unlike Google maps which cannot be used in legal disputes, and positional accuracy cannot be guaranteed by digital maps, ToI reported.

“The focus will be on dispute resolution and generating land record databases under programme Swamitva”, said Ashutosh Sharma, secretary of the Department of Science and Technology.

These maps will be also used by police, paramilitary agencies, strategic and border security agencies.

This article was first published on India Infrahub.