Update on the New Land Acquisition Bill

The  Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill 2011 has been renamed the Right to Fair Compensation, Resettlement, Rehabilitation and Transparency in Land Acquisition Bill 2012 after incorporation of some of recommendations of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Rural Development.

Interestingly, the new draft met with opposition within the Union Cabinet and has been referred to a Group of Ministers for further deliberation.

The Economic Times has more on the opposition in the Cabinet to the Bill.

A combative Jairam Ramesh, however, denied that the Bill has been put into cold storage. The Minister also ruled out any change to the basic structure of the Bill.  

Earlier, in a response to Medha Patkar' attack on the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill 2011, the Minister for Rural Development and Drinking Water, Mr. Jairam Ramesh asserted that the state must have a role in acquisition in imperfect land markets like India. 

The Minister also argued that the new Bill, unlike any statute in the past, guarantees that no individual shall be dispossessed unless the alternatives enumerated in the Bill are provided for.   

Mihir Shah, Member of the Planning Commission, echoed Jairam Ramesh in this opinion-piece, pointing out that the Bill "seeks to provide strict time-lines within which the land acquisition as well as the R&R process, have to be completed. This includes a provision of six months for the SIA process and an overall limit of 35 months for the land acquisition process. Full payment of compensation will be made within six months from the date of the award. It has also been provided that in case of irrigation or hydro-power projects, R&R will be completed six months before submergence."