Policy and Financing Framework for Livelihoods
21
to acquisition of fertile land, waiving off
the social impact analysis, disenfranchising
people of their livelihoods without viable
alternatives and perceived unfair compen-
sation. Farmers’ organisations have been
against the Bill in its present forms as also
several non-governmental organisations
(NGOs). From livelihoods perspective, loss
of land invariably causes disruption of a
familiar livelihood and places vulnerable
in jeopardy. It is not just the landowner
who suffers in the process of acquisition
but others also who depend on the land
for their employment, either as tenants or
as labourers. When the acquiring entity is
not sensitive, the promised rehabilitation
becomes a mirage. It has been estimated that
there are about 60million displaced persons/
project-affected persons (DPs/PAPs) since
independence till 2000 and as per the gov-
ernment’s sources, at least 75 per cent of
them have not been rehabilitated. The High
Level Committee set up by the Government
of India
3
estimated that of the total displaced
due to development projects, 47 per cent
was tribal population. Typically, the tribal
population does not have the resources or
access to information to present its case. The
Committee observed in its report:
The 2013 Act already has a provision for
safeguarding food security and states that
multi-crop irrigated land will not be acquired,
except as a last resort measure. Further, the
State Government is to set limits on the
acquisition of such land under this law. States
are also required to set a limit on the area of
agricultural land that can be acquired in any
given district. However, there is no mention
of the need to protect tribal land and commu-
nity resources. Hence, a suitable provision is
required to be incorporated in the Act, to safe-
guard tribal land and community resources
in Scheduled Areas and disallow acquisition
by a non-tribal, including private companies.
•
The definition of ‘public purpose’ in the
new law is very wide and will only lead to
greater acquisition and displacement in
Scheduled Areas. The exercise of ‘eminent
domain’ and definition of ‘public purpose’
should be severely limited.
•
Government agencies acquiring land with
the ultimate purpose to transfer it to pri-
vate companies for stated public purpose,
should be kept outside the ambit of the new
law, as the Public-Private Partnershipmode
of acquiring land is simply a backdoor
method of alienating land in violation of
the Constitutional provision to prohibit or
restrict transfer of tribal land to non-tribals
in Scheduled Areas.
3
Report of the High Level Committee on Socio-economic, Health and Educational Status of Tribal Communities
of India by Professor Virginius Xaxa, Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Government of India, May 2014.
Even as the pros and cons of the Land
AcquisitionBill are being debated, Government
of Andhra Pradesh has the real and immedi-
ate problem of finding about 45,000 hectares
of land for building its new capital city. The
Government apparently has found a way out.
The proposal is to make all farmers stakehold-
ers in the new capital, so that they voluntarily
‘pool’ their land with the city’s development
agency. Once the city is developed in a decade,
they will get back almost 30 per cent of their
pooled land as highly-priced city land. This
return of one-third of the land after ten years
makes the farmers see land pooling as the
means of getting wealthy. The Government of
Andhra Pradesh has also offered the farmers
a monthly payment per acre as high or higher
than the ongoing leasing rate for farmland.
Loans taken for agriculture of upto
`
1.5 lakh
will be waived off. Landless labourers will get a
monthly pension of
`
2,500. Skill-development
centres have been opened to train farmers in
new occupations. The Employment Guarantee
Scheme is supposed to provide work every day
of the year. If this model works out, it will be a
painless alternative and with willing participa-
tion of the landowners.
Source:
Based on newspaper reports.
Box 2.3:
Painless land acquisition
