Land Law Must Give Way to a Better One





The goods and services tax is more important than the land Bill, said Adi Godrej, speaking for many . He is spot on. The land acquisition law is flawed in fundamental ways, not just in the version that the government now wants to distance itself from but in its 2013 form forged by the UPA. The problem is not just in terms of specific provisions of the law but far more basic. India's growing economy needs land to be released for new economic activity , without doubt. This has to be understood as a challenge of urbanisation, rather than merely as a policy of releasing patches of land across the country .As industry and organised services grow faster than agriculture, and look for expanded urban environs to accommodate them, urbanisation happens. More urban spaces come up and more people move from village to town. If half of India beco mes urban over the next 20 years -China has crossed this point already -roughly 25 crore more people will be added to Ind ia's urban population. With any reasona ble measure of population density , something like 20,000 sq km of additional urban land will be needed to accommodate this incremental urban population. Existing towns will need to expand and rebuild, new towns will need to be built. Does the land law of either the UPA or the NDA address the challenge of releasing land on this scale?
The point is to make those who lose land to economic progress stakeholders in the prosperity that comes up on their erstwhile land. There is no unique one way of doing this. But the stakeholder principle must be incorporated into whatever mechanism is adopted to release forest or agricultural land for new economic use. That should be the only purpose of a central law on the subject. Industry and farmers have to learn to become partners in India's progress.