LAND ACQUISITION MUST BE TRANSPARENT'
As the scorching pace of land acquisition for special economic zones or industrialisation purposes has made the jittery peasantry take to the streets, bolstered by the non-governmental organisations, the issue has been hijacked by political parties. It is small wonder that no less a person than the Prime Minister proclaimed at the annual general meeting of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) on January 8, that "issues such as land acquisition and displacement of people and their rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) should be addressed transparently and effectively. They can and will be."
He also doused the ire of the farming community over the land acquisition for industrialisation, stating that his government would be finalising a new rehabilitation policy in the next three months, which will be "more progressive, humane and conducive to the long-term welfare of all the stakeholders in our economy".
Against this backdrop of simmering tensions over the new export model exemplified by the SEZs, which duly qualify for State patronage to a substantial extent and duration, the Minister of State for Commerce, Jairam Ramesh, defends the policy for exporters and cites his senior colleague, Kamal Nath, who once said: "SEZs require land. They are not built in the air and they are built on the ground". Ramesh contends the real question is the mode of acquisition of the land — whether farmers get the real compensation for the land, whether the prime agricultural land has been diverted for SEZs, whether SEZ projects are really creating value and not becoming real-estate projects.
"We have to build safeguards. A lot of hullabaloo is created on the land issue. It is serious in some areas when a project goes about acquiring 10,000 acres. We need to approach this in a balanced way, without getting into a theological debate on industry versus agriculture".
The reality is the groundswell of protests against the proliferation of these SEZs, the latest to draw prolonged and violent protests being and Nandigram, both in West Bengal, ruled by the Marxist Party which lends outside support to the United Progressive Alliance Government at the Centre.
To put the issue in perspective and seek his views on the adverse consequences of the reforms pursued by the Department of Commerce, and also to address the related concerns, Business Line spoke to the articulate and urbane Jairam Ramesh.
Excerpts from the interview:
"I think the acquisition of land by the Government and then giving it to private parties is something that needs to be reviewed as this approach does not yield maximum benefit to the farmers. If there is private transaction between industry and the farmers, the latter must be ensured of market rates. Having said this, one should also realise that in States such as Kerala and West Bengal with dense population and intensive cultivation, if you want some industrialisation there, you would have to give up agricultural land. This is a problem that is peculiar to these two States but not Haryana.
Punjab's population may not be dense, but it certainly has the most intensive form of cultivation. So we need industrialisation and modern industry, which will require land. But the real issue is compensation. Now, who gets the compensation — the tiller, the peasant or the sharecropper or the one who has the title to the land? Operation Burga was a great step forward and I applaud the CPM government for taking the initiative. The Burgadas themselves have sub-let their lands — in many cases to tenants and sharecroppers who do not get the full benefit of compensation — while the Burgadas based in Kolkata get it. We need to address this issue.
Jairam Ramesh, minister of state for commerce