New land acquisition bill will aggravate farmers' distress: legal experts

Senior advocate Rajeev Dhawan and his team of lawyers spent considerable time deliberating different versions of the land acquisition drafts and comparing them.

They have put together working papers on the provisions in the new draft of the Land Acquisition and Resettlement and Rehabilitation Bill, 2011, tabled in Parliament on September 7. The papers discuss the draw backs and legal implications of the proposed Act that will apply to all land acquisitions in the country.

The papers scrutinise the bill clause by clause and section by section. On the whole the proposed Act seems to be progressive and pro-farmers, but if read with each clause, one can see that the present act is draconian in nature and can lead to further distress in the agrarian economy, the experts conclude.

The proposed Act gives unchallengeable powers to the state to acquire land and makes provisions to avoid redressing grievances of people whose land is acquired, the paper says.

The papers

Land acquisition and rehabilitation & resettlement bill (LARR), 2011 - General problems and specific deficiencies

Aide-Memoire on land acquisition and rehabilitation & resettlement bill (LARR), 2011