In a bid to encourage farmers to part with their land for industrial development, the Gujarat government has formulated a new land acquisition policy to make them partners in the development.
Announcing this, Minister of State for Industries Saurabh Patel said the State-owned Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC) henceforth would acquire land only with the “consent” of the concerned farmers, pay them at the prevailing market price, and give them a share in the higher price after the infrastructural development.
He said the market price of each piece of land would be decided not by the government or any middlemen but by the Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology University (CEPT). Besides getting the market price, farmers would also be paid later 10 per cent of the price secured from the industries allotted to the developed plot. One per cent holding of the developed plots would also be given back to the original land-owning farmer for the purpose of commercial activities or bought back by the GIDC at commercial rates.
In the case of a land owner losing the entire holding, he or she would be paid an additional 750 days of minimum agricultural wages as part of compensation for the loss of livelihood, which according to the present wage structure works out to about Rs. 75,000 and in case of partial land acquisition, the owner would be paid an additional 500 days of minimum wages, or about Rs. 50,000. The GIDC would not only insist on priority in the jobs in industrial estates for these farmers, but also sponsor one person from each family in the age group between 18 and 45 years for skilled training in the ITIs or similar approved institutions for any vocation of his or her choice. The expense, Rs. 70,000 per trainee for two years, would be borne by the GIDC.
For the development of the villages, the GIDC would also deposit in a separate account three per cent of the difference of the original land cost and the allotment price which would be used for public utility services in the concerned village, including schools, hospitals, internal roads, and community hall.
The GIDC, Mr. Patel, said would also undertake the development of plots in public-private partnership if any group of industries decided to set up sector-specific industrial perks on a minimum of 100 hectares of land. The land acquisition in such cases would entirely be the responsibility of the private industries, but the GIDC would pay for 50 per cent share of the cost of development and other expenses to be recovered from the beneficiary industries in five years.
He said the new policy was formulated to ensure that the poor farmers were not misled into parting with their land at throwaway prices and to make them effective partners in the development of the State. The new policy was necessitated because of the increasing heavy demand for land for industrial development and the shortage of the government land for the purpose. He, however, declined to comment on a question whether the farmers in the State were against giving up their land for industrialisation as was being experienced in many other States in the country.
