The Telangana Government’s ambitious plan for irrigating one crore acres by procuring one lakh acres for taking up and completing ongoing irrigation projects now hinges on the Centre’s clearance to the amendments proposed by it to the Land Acquisition Act, 2013.
Hopes for early clearance were high initially when Telangana Assembly passed the new Bill, “Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Telangana Amendment) Act, 2016”, and sent it for the clearance of the Centre as the original act was passed by Parliament. The Centre’s approval should be followed by the President’s assent for the amendments to become operational.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao met the Union ministers concerned in person and explained them as to how the amendment would help Telangana in speedier land acquisition for irrigation projects as well as expeditious rehabilitation of the project affected families, avoiding litigation.
The Central Government Act, 2013 involved several procedural aspects. It introduced processes like Social Impact Assessment (SIA) and development plan.“Each process may take any length of time more so when the opposition parties seem to be intent on derailing the irrigation projects by instigating people to file petitions in the court for political gains,” allege ruling party members.
The State Government brought in G.O. 123 for consent award to overcome delays under the L.A. Act, 2013 when there was a willing seller and buyer. It also brought out G.O.190 and 191 and recently G.O. 38 to protect the interest of agriculture labourers, artisans and other vulnerable sections.
This, however, came in for criticism that farmers were being coerced to part with their land under G.O. 123. People’s organisations, project affected villagers and opposition parties alleged that there was no voluntary decision by farmers as was made out to be under G.O. 123. Several petitions were filed against the G.O. 123 that it was not in consonance with the the Central L.A. Act, 2013. The Irrigation Department since been debarred to procure land under G.O. 123 by the Court. With the irrigation projects getting delayed, the Telangana Government chose the route of amendment as done by other States like Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu that amended the Act to suit their requirements. Telangana too passed a Bill in December 2016 seeking exemption from certain provisions of the original Act for determining public purposes like irrigation projects on par with defence projects.
“It has been more than two months and the Revenue Department clarified the queries posed by the Ministry of Home Affairs. Problem now is how to assess the number of project-ffected people under the L.A. 123 Act for providing Relief and Rehabilitation measures when there is no total submergence of a village. Because project affected is a broad term including farmers owning lands, tenant farmers, agricultural labour, artisans”, government sources explain.
Irrigation Department sources said that work was going on wherever the land was already acquired but projects that were in critical stage of completion, but for small tracts of land for linking, were stalled due to delay in land acquisition
“We suggested to the court that village development committee be constituted and the Government will deposit the compensation under R&R with the committee. The committee will be responsible for identifying the affected families in the village for transparency and accountability and hand over fair compensation. But we are yet to get the court’s view” sources said.
