Land laws’ amendment to open up Pandora’s box

new delhi: the country’s land acquisition law is set to be changed. yet, one of the changes sought to be made is likely to open the pandora’s box. the changes, set to be made in the context of speeding up the ambitious, prime minister’s gram sadak yojana (the rural road project), visualises the introduction of two land acquisition-related laws in the country, one of which would be in the form of an amendment to the existing land acquisition act of 1894, while the other would be in the form of the national rehabilitation act for resettling the displaced. in case of the proposed amendments to the land acquisition act, provisions are being made for higher and timely compensation. while this has been demanded by ngos for long, the rub lies in the portion relating to rehabilitation, where provisions are being made for assured government jobs being offered to the displaced. significantly, the issue has been thrashed out at the group of ministers headed by arun jaitley, before a cabinet note was prepared by the rural development ministry and sent to the cabinet secretariat. feedback coming from political circles is that while there was a consensus on the higher and timely compensation to the displaced, the gom was divided on the issue of assured jobs, particularly in the context of government’s avowed commitment to right-sizing. interestingly, the rural development ministry, which is the nodal ministry for the rural roads programme, had its own reasons for insertion of this provision. while rural development minister venkaiah naidu was unavailable for comment, his iewpoint at the gom seems to have been that unlike most projects, a road development project involves the acquisition of prime land, adjoining the road. for the displaced, it represents not merely value in terms of the price of the land, but it also represents value as a means of employment. naidu’s argument was that while compensation plans take into consideration the former, they do not provide for the latter. hence, specific provisions had to be made in law for compensating for the loss of job. since the government was the acquirer of land in this instance, assured jobs should be provided for in the proposed rehabilitation law. the gom, on its part, was more in favour of providing “where possible�, but mr naidu plumed for man-datory jobs as he was certain that no project implementor would abide by the norms unless provided for in law. significantly, the rural development ministry’s move is being opposed by other ministries, particularly the telecom, railways, the central works departments and others whose daily business is acquisition of private land for developmental purposes. these ministries have pointed out that the assured job requirement would make land acquisition impossible for projects. given these difference, the gom has decided that the concerned ministries would slug it out in the cabinet. interestingly, the proposal is bound to find favour with ngos who have continuously punched holes into the government’s land acquisition laws. some of the flaws that have been repeatedly pointed out by the ngos include that fact that governments do not minimise displacement or adopt least displacing alternatives. other flaws include not giving compensation before land acquisition. moreover, only patta (deed) holders are compensated. the others who lose their livelihood, have to justify their claim to compensation for it. it is not for the project to ensure that they are compensated. rehabilitation is also not mandatory. interestingly, while india’s land acquisition law is old, the country does not have a proper national resettlement and rehabilitation policy. only three states, maharashtra, madhya pradesh and punjab, have state wide resettlement and rehabilitation (r&r) policies. the maharashtra project affected people’s rehabi-litation act of 1976, amended in 1986, is the most comprehensive.