Man uses Claude AI to find ancestral land in UP, internet says ‘this changes everything’

In a time where digital tools are becoming part of daily life, artificial intelligence is now showing up in places people did not expect. From handling complex documents to simplifying difficult searches, AI is slowly becoming useful beyond regular online tasks. A recent story from Uttar Pradesh has now gone viral online for showing how AI was used to help trace long-standing family land records that were difficult to navigate manually.

Ancestral land records become a complex puzzle

The incident came to public attention through a LinkedIn post by Zahid Khan. He explained that his family’s ancestral land is located in Mohammadpur village in Uttar Pradesh. The land has been passed down through generations, starting from his great-grandfather, then to his grandfather, followed by his father, and now to him.

Even though the land belongs to the family, identifying the exact plots was not simple. Khan mentioned that he had visited the village only a few times, which made the task more difficult.

The biggest challenge came from how the records were stored and written.
“The land records are digitized but spread across multiple government websites, all in dense official Hindi that's genuinely hard to parse even if you can read the language. The kind of Hindi that makes legal documents feel like ancient scripture,” he explained.

Claude AI used to navigate government portals

To deal with this issue, Khan used Anthropic’s AI assistant Claude and its “computer use” feature. The AI helped him go through government land record portals step by step.

During this process, the system even typed his late father’s name in Hindi using an on-screen keyboard while searching through the records.

The AI was able to identify land-related entries connected to the family and extract official Gata Sankhya numbers, which are used to identify land plots. It mapped details related to 25 different land parcels in total.

Mapping data and technical processing

The challenge became more technical when mapping databases were accessed. The coordinates available were in Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) format instead of standard latitude and longitude values.

To handle this, the AI suggested a method to extract polygon points from the available land data.

After processing, the coordinates were converted into standard mapping format. A KML file was created and uploaded to Google My Maps, which resulted in a clear visual map showing the exact boundaries of the ancestral land.

Online reactions to the AI use case

The story has drawn attention on social media, where users discussed how AI could help simplify access to complex government data and systems.

One user wrote, “This is among the few real use cases I've come across for AI use, which is super encouraging. This should be augmented as an agent into the Govt. Registrar of Property website.”

Another comment read, “Fascinating use case, Al, bridging language and bureaucracy to reconnect families with their roots. Shows how tooling can turn archival data into personal stories.”

A third user added, “This is so cool! India definitely has massive amounts of digitized yet still unusable data. AI agents navigating these kinds of government workflows may unlock enormous value over the next few years.”
Disclaimer: The information and reactions mentioned in this article are based on a viral LinkedIn post and public social media comments. The Times of India has not independently verified the claims, technical processes, land records, or results described by the user. Thumb image: LinkedIn/Zahid Khan