New Delhi : After eating dust in trying to dilute the UPA-time land acquisition law through three Ordinances and repeated attempt in Parliament that the Opposition blocked with nationwide protests, the Centre is trying to apply correctives to please the land owners, basically the farmers, by offering them better deal.
The Rural Development Ministry is ready with the rules necessary for implementing the law, providing the highest compensation and better rehabilitation package than what has been offered by most of the state governments. A ministry official said the rules planned for the Union Territories would set an example and prompt states to revise their compensation norms.
The compensation will be exactly 4 times the market value in rural areas and twice in urban areas in Union territories. The rules will be notified by the department of land resources in the rural development ministry. Under the Right To Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act of 2013, the states are at liberty to fix the compensation in case of the rural areas at anywhere between two and four times, depending on the area’s distance from the nearest urban centre.
Since land is on the concurrent list in the Constitution, both Centre and States can make laws and rules.
As such, the state governments are already free to tweak the Act and as such most of the states have gone for the lowest possible multiplier — set at the minimum twice the market value at par with the compensation in the urban areas. A draft that Maharashtra law proposed has the compensation at 2.02 times the value.
The rules to be notified for the Union Territories also seek to expand the number of beneficiaries eligible for rehabilitation and resettlement packages when individual farmers sell land for projects. Currently, only those selling plot above a certain threshold are eligible for such packages. The rules seek to fix the threshold at 50 acres in urban and 100 acres in rural areas.
