Opinion Contested acres

In this regard,both UP and Haryana have evolved reasonably good land acquisition policies which many other states are keen to emulate. A closer study of the Haryana land acquisition policy shows how the state government learnt very quickly to pre-empt potential resentment among farmers over selling land to either the public sector or private companies.

The minimum floor price for acquiring land was a mere Rs 2.5 lakh per acre in Haryana until 2005. Later,when private companies began acquiring land for special economic zones and other purposes,the minimum floor price went up to Rs 22 lakh per acre in 2007 and increased further to Rs 35 lakh per acre last year. This just shows how the value of land is going up in negotiated settlements between farmers and private companies. Even the public sector company Nuclear Power Corporation of India has offered a floor price of Rs 45 lakh per acre for land it wants to acquire for a nuclear power plant in Haryana’s Fatehabad district.

The Yamuna Expressway project from Greater Noida to Agra is also the first major attempt by any state government at creating new urban dwellings along the highway. Land along the way has been acquired from farmers through negotiated settlements at prices ranging from Rs 40 lakh to Rs 80 lakh per acre. The UP government has also emulated Haryana’s policy of giving farmers an annual payment of Rs 20,000 per acre for 33 years,besides a one-time settlement price for land surrendered. Also,a small portion of the developed land is to go back to the farmer’s family for housing purposes.

These packages,in some ways,reflect the manner in which land acquisition policy is evolving within a democratic framework to drive India’s capitalist development. The political class has well understood that land is a very emotive issue which has the potential to overthrow governments in elections.

In this regard,West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has been extremely candid in admitting the lessons he had learnt from his experience in Singur where the farmers’ agitation led to the Tatas abandoning their small-car project. Singed by that experience,he now says it is important to avoid acquiring fertile multi-crop land,and to have a full consensus amongst landowners over the compensation and rehabilitation package.

Mamata Banerjee perhaps understood this better than Buddhadeb when she invoked the fears of the farmers in Singur and Nandigram during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections which gave the shivers to the Left Front for the first time in more than 30 years. It is not without reason that the politically wily leader of the Trinamool Congress kept insisting that the amendments to the primitive Land Acquisition Act of 1894,which was on top of the agenda for UPA 2,be put off till the current Bengal assembly elections.

That meant putting on hold a vastly improved land acquisition legislation which takes away government discretion to acquire land and mandates that industry directly negotiate prices with farmers who must be adequately compensated for giving up their agriculture land. Even the improved land acquisition legislation had left scope for compulsory government acquisition for at least 30 per cent of the landmass to ensure contiguity. The Centre was willing to bring this down to 20 per cent so that at least 80 per cent of the land is acquired by direct negotiation between industry and farmers.

Mamata’s opposition stemmed from the fact that the Singur agitation was led by owners of less than 15 per cent of the total land. The rest had been acquired through negotiated settlements. It was Mamata’s implicit commitment to the minority Singur farmers,who led the agitation,that the amended law would not be weighed against minority farmers’ interests in any way.

Assuming she comes to power with a significant majority,Mamata will have to take a stand on how the land acquisition legislation should be amended. The Land Acquisition Act cannot remain hostage to electoral politics for ever. For if 90 per cent of the people want a negotiated settlement and only a few insist on not going along,there must be some democratic way of resolving this. The political class must show vision in this regard. Mamata would do well to make her stand clear on the land acquisition legislation after the Bengal elections results are out.

Another critical aspect of the new land acquisition bill that Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee is looking at is how narrowly should acquisition for “public purpose” be defined. The current legislation of 1894 vintage defines “public purpose” very broadly. Almost everything can come under the ambit of public purpose,even if the government acquires land to hand over to industry.

However,the proposed amendment seeks to define “public purpose” very narrowly,only to include land acquired to provide public goods such as roads,transport infrastructure,schools,colleges,etc. But what if these facilities are being built under a public-private partnership framework? (The Yamuna Expressway,for instance,is a PPP project.) These are tricky questions and must be finessed into the new legislation.

The writer is Managing Editor,‘The Financial Express’