Minister of Rural Development Birender Singh on Friday defended the ordinance amending the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) Act 2013.
“Under Section 105, 13 exempt laws had to be brought into the Act before a year ended since the notification of the Act in January 2014. The Secretary, Land Resources, tells me that after there was a consultation in June and after that in October, we were told that we will have to issue the ordinance,” he told mediapersons. “If I were angry [over the ordinance], why would I be in the Cabinet,” asked Mr. Singh, to a question whether he opposed the changes to the Land Act exempting several categories of projects from consent requirements.
Under Section 105 of LARR Act, 13 central laws, including the National Highways Act 1956, the Railways Act 1989, Coal Bearing Areas Acquisition and Development Act 1957, are exempt from the provisions of the Land Act.
The Act, however, required that within a year from its commencement, the government may allow LARR’s provisions of rehabilitation to apply even in acquisition under the 13 laws that are currently exempt, subject to Parliament’s approval.
While Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had spoken of only exempting special categories of projects, including industrial corridors, infrastructure and social infrastructure, defence, under a new Section 10A, when he issued a public statement on Monday, details of the ordinance, which Mr. Singh shared, revealed four more crucial changes to the Act.
The ordinance amends Section 101, which provided that if land is acquired for a public or public-private project but remains unutilised for five years, it will revert to the original land owner. The period of five years has been substituted by “a period specified for setting up of any project, or five years, whichever is later.”
It also amends Section 24(2) to exclude time spent on litigation in cases where a stay order has been passed which had been accepted by the Supreme Court as a period which would be included in five years. It changes the definition of compensation to include compensation lying “in any account maintained for this purpose.”
Further, it changes Section 87 to say that in case of a violation by a central or state official, a court can take cognisance only in line with Section 197 of Criminal Procedure Code. The original Act said in case of violations the Heads of Department will be held responsible as well.
The fourth major change brought in by the ordinance extends the time period specified by the LARR Act to take action necessary to implement the law from two years to five years now.
