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Karat rules out need for Buddha deputyCalcutta Telegraph - - Sep 1, 2009 "We have to rework the land acquisition policy. There won't be any large-scale land acquisition for industry," he said, adding the state was working on a ... Mamata's land bank: The pros and consRediff - Sep 2, 2009 So what is this land bank? Will it be effecetive? How far will it be successful in solving the problem of land acquisition that plagues West Bengal? ... People not against acquisition for welfareTimes of India - Aug 14, 2009 KOLKATA: Land and land reforms minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah feels the people of Bengal do not mind giving up land for projects that involve public welfare. ... West Bengal to acquire land for railway projects Bombay News Left plays land cardCalcutta Telegraph - Aug 31, 2009 31: The ruling Left today tried to win back farmers, warning them that they would lose their land if Mamata Banerjee came to power in Bengal in 2011. ... Post-Nano, state gets mega projectTimes of India - - Aug 29, 2009 And that's certainly good news for Bengal." His confidence stems from the fact that the progress with land acquisition has been heartening. Panagarh land may be handed over in 6 months Times of India Marxists in a tight spot post Vedic village incidentEconomic Times - Aug 29, 2009 KOLKATA: After Nandigram and Singur, it is the Vedic Village issue which has landed the ruling Marxists in West Bengal in a tight spot. ... Vedic churn in Bengal politics Calcutta Telegraph Furore at LF meet, CM promises action Expressindia.com Mamata points Vedic finger at Deb Calcutta Telegraph Varsity plan faces acquisition hurdleTimes of India - - Aug 19, 2009 KOLKATA: Land and minority. The two most pressing issues of West Bengal polity have clouded one of chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee's priority ... Calcutta tea park plan hits land hurdleCalcutta Telegraph - - Aug 30, 2009 30: The government's plan to set up a tea park in Calcutta to help exporters has hit a roadblock because of problems over land acquisition. ... |
WB housing minister says no IT infrastructure near Vedic Village
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CPM, Trinamool in soup as land scam rocks Bengal - 3 days ago
The Vedic Village scandal is now threatening to snowball into a major land scam involving both the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist and the ...Rediff - 42 related articles »
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The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Frontpage | A land scam case
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Deb delivers land query blowTimes of India - Aug 28, 2009 Chief secretary Chakrabarti said the role of the land mafia, if any, would be probed. "It has to be properly investigated. Also, the total area of the ... Big names in Gaffar's land game Calcutta Telegraph Vedic fire: State Cong brass meets Guv for a CBI probe Expressindia.com Hunting for land mafia, CPM & Trinamool men turn goondasEconomic Times - Aug 25, 2009 ... West Bengal governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee and sought their help to protect their land. ... Gaffar had free access to resort Times of India Rehabilitation fund for land acquisitionMerinews - Aug 26, 2009 Following a dispute over a football match, the henchmen of a land mafia attacked the playing field with firearms and bombs killing one person and injuring ... Why this throwaway sale of state property in Karachi?The News International - - Aug 13, 2009 Karachi is today believed to be the worst victim of land mafia, where the state-owned land and properties are being grabbed by powerful and influential ... Maoists preparing for battleThe Palestine Telegraph - - Aug 12, 2009 It is a complex cocktail ~ the Maoist revolution, mainstream politics, the local mafia (land, forest, mines and of other resources) whom they tax,but in ... Racism And Corruption In Pro-Coal, Pro-War, Pro-Zionist, Climate ...CounterCurrents.org - - Aug 7, 2009 ... famine in British-ruled India that killed 6-7 million Indians in the "forgotten" World War 2 Bengal Famine (see recent BBC broadcast involving Dr Polya, ... |
Addressing a public meeting in Kolakta recently, CPI General Secretary A B Bardhan ascribed corruption, ego and high handedness by members and leaders of the Left Front as the reasons behind the Front's poll debacle in Kerala and West Bengal.
In West Bengal, the Front had deviated from its main plank of land reforms and sought forcible acquisition of land from farmers in Nandigram and Singur in the name of industrialisation, he alleged.
Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has argued that the Left needs to engage in a dialogue, particularly on the issue of ending poverty. Perhaps he is urging the Left to look at China, which has catapulted its growth rate in the last 30 years. "There is enough fierceness of the prevailing political arrangement and it has not helped to harness India's potential for a high growth rate. It never seemed to grow," says Sen.Hindustan Times reports.
We all know all about Bengali Economists since sixties from Arjusn Sengupta and Ashok Mitra to Dr Amartya sen and all about their role in Policy making! All these Gentlemen have been HARD Core Committed Personalities well known to justify the Manusmriti ways of Economy and society. They remain the best, most Creditable Faces of the Ruling Hegemony! Ashok Mitra was the finance Minister in Jyoti basu Cabinet while Marichjhanpi genocide had been EVENTED! He NEVER spoke a single word against the Genocide culture!All the VULTURES of Culture Industry who had been FED and favoured for Luxury by the Marxists, have Turned into the ANGELS of CHANGE! The Genocide master of Marichjhanpi, AMIYO samanto turned a CULUMNIST in a News Paper Reputed for supporting the Resistance. Rachhpal Singh, IAS, hounded in BHIKHARI Paswan case and Sultan Singh, who physically beat Ms Mamata Bannerjee, have become the KEY Stones of Resistance! SO most of the retired IAS and IPS officers succeeded to clean the Slate as the Political Parties are EXPERT to Wipe Out the History of ETHNIC Cleansing! ABHIRUP Sarkar, SUGAT Marjit and Dipankar dasgupt, the bunch of Economists who projected Buddha as the GOD of development, try to DEMONISE him this times!
DR. Amarty sen had been a KNOWN friend of the Marxists who is well reputed to defend US Corporate Imperialist zionist interests with Bangladeshi Economist Md, YUNUS, have always advocated NGO MNC Corporate Raj!
His thoughts on Society and economy are very very Hyped in Media Toilet!
Prakash Karat, general secretary of the CPI(M), entered the debate through an article in People's Democracy while defending his party's role in taking up the pro-poor policies of the UPA government. Repeated claims of getting the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) Bill passed do not entitle the Left to the sole authorship of the scheme. In fact, no political outfit challenged the passage of the NREGS Bill. Likewise there are numerous programmes like Bharat Nirman, Ambedkar Awas Yojana, Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana, etc., that were announced in the Budget.
It must be reiterated that the Congress government, in 1991, laid the foundations of India's modern economy. It propelled the growth rate from 2-3 per cent to the present 9 per cent mark.
Let Karat understand that economic reforms built a strong framework to eventually meet social sector expenses like subsidising health, housing and other aspects that raise the standard of living of poor people. Direct tax collections, in the last five years, have tripled to nearly Rs 4 lakh crore. Economic reforms have generated huge revenues for the government not only to finance NREGS on a national scale but also other pro-poor policies.
It is time that the country demands an honest explanation from Karat and his party, which has ruled West Bengal for one-third of a century. There is a need for him to clarify what specific anti-poverty measures have contributed to the well-being of the poor in West Bengal. If Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu can sell cheap grain at Rs 2 per kg, why can't the Marxist government do the same?
Further, if one compares per capita expenditure on social services with other states, the pathetic performance of the West Bengal government is obvious. According to the Reserve Bank of India, in West Bengal, social sector expenditure to total expenditure declined to 23.4 per cent in 2003-04 from 46.91 in 1990-91. But it increased in the last four years and, according to the Budget of 2007-08, it was 35.1 per cent, still less than other poorer states.
It compares badly to the figures of other poorer states like Bihar (40.8 per cent), Chhattisgarh 44.8 (per cent), Jharkhand (43.7 per cent), Madhya Pradesh (37.8 per cent) and Rajasthan (38.2 per cent). It shouldn't also be forgotten that social sector spending has increased only in the last four years because the central government hugely increased the funding on pro-poor programmes in the states.
If we look at the record of land reforms in West Bengal, one finds that tenancy rights are protected and land is not given to the tiller. Have the Marxists learnt a lesson that keeping people poor is in their best interest?
The global collapse of Communism must be studied and lessons learnt sooner than later before India's Left becomes redundant and archaic. As it is, the appeal of the Left is on the decline and it is no wonder that India's young refuse to join it. The CPI(M) would do well to take on board Sen's advice.
''Why did not the state government go for a consensus in case of Vedic Village? We have instructed our party activists to organise a campaign by conducting road shows, meetings and processions throughout the state,'' Mr Bhattacharjee added.
The Vedic Village came under police scrutiny following the recovery of huge arsenal and bombs, and allegation of land encroachment.
A large cache of illegal arms and ammunition was recovered from the resort following violence on August 23 in connection with a clash over a football match that led to the killing of a person.
Indian xpress reports:
The 600-acre IT park at Rajarhat, near Kolkata, is the latest casualty of Bengal's land acquisition tragedy and the state government's abdication of responsibility post-Singur, post-electoral rout. The CPM appears to be struck by a paralysis of will that's putting every developmental project on hold. If the government, led by the party, keeps retiring hurt, paranoid about the next election, the list of the disappointed will not end with a Tata Motors or an Infosys — notwithstanding a reformist chief minister who's been missing the plot for a while and an intriguing land reforms minister who opposes industrial land acquisition, but gave vested land to a luxury resort, and now, caught up in controversy, wants the IT park scrapped.
Indeed, the IT park is inextricably tied up with the Vedic Village controversy, as the land is contiguous to the resort and was to be acquired by Vedic's developers for the government. Following violence and allegations of forcible land acquisition, the government has retreated. If Singur was about state acquisition of land, Vedic Village has exploded "direct" acquisition by developers. Evidently, neither Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee's nor Mamata Banerjee's preferred means of acquiring land is working. But the state government should not equate the mechanism of land acquisition with the fact of acquisition. The problem is with the former alone, where compensation packages do matter, while using goons unleashes all the goriness of Bengal's brand of muscle politics.
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/losing-plots/511716/
A two-day meeting of the Samiti would be held from September 19 to chalk out a future course of action in support of their demands, they added.
The Supreme Court on Monday issued notices to Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Kerala Government over the state Governor's permission to CBI to prosecute Pinarayi Vijayan.
The apex court was hearing the petition filed by Vijayan, challenging the governor's sanction for his prosecution by the CBI.
Vijayan is the politburo member of Communist party of India (Marxist) (CPM)
A bench of the apex court comprising Justice R.V. Ravindran and Justice B.S. Sudarsan Reddy admitted Vijayan's lawsuit directly for hearing.
The bench stated that the petition involved several important questions of law.
Vijayan is facing the charges of by passing the regulations while awarding a contract to a Canadian based company, SNC Lavalin for renovating three power plants when he was Kerala's power minister in 1997.
The charges against Vijayan were filed in a special court after Kerala Governor R.S. Gavai gave the green signal to the CBI to prosecute the stalwart of communist movement in June.
Earlier, the central agency had asked Vijayan to appear before the CBI court at Kochi on September 24.
The Rs.374-crore SNC Lavalin scam, has created a tussle between Vijayan and State Chief Minister V.S.Achhuthanandan.
In West Bengal, land reforms occupy an important position in the rural development policy of the left Front Government. Since its coming into power, it has been laying thrust on the rural development works. Land reforms are integral part of rural development and as such it needs to be placed firmly in the forefront of rural development strategy. The Government of West Bengal formulates and implements policies towards the fulfillment of that objective.
The land reforms programme of the Government of West Bengal aims at putting and end to the feudal and semi-feudal system, prevalent in the country throughout ages and centuries, by implementing the Zamindari Abolition Act, 1953 and Land Reforms Act, 1955 after making fundamental amendments to the same. It also ensures the cultivators to enjoy their just rights and possession over the land and agricultural products. Thus, the exploitation of the feudal landlords rolls into the pages of history. Direct participation of the people at large and their representatives as well of the rural areas finds best exposition in the developmental schemes and projects of the Government.
With the sole aims and objectives to reduce disparity and irregularities in the rural economic structure by bringing about a change in the ownership of land and land tenancy system the Government takes adequate measures to distribute vested lands among the landless and poor peasantry and safeguard the rights of the share croppers under comprehensive multipurpose programmes.
The Panchayat bodies are largely involved for executing the land reforms policies of the Government. However, the programmes for financing bargadars and assignees of vested lands are normally implemented through the nationalized commercial banks and rural banks to get them free of the clutches of land owners. Besides this, bargadars and assignees of vested lands are given priority in the selection of beneficiaries in may other rural development programmes.
CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat addresses a national convention in New Delhi on Wednesday.
NEW DELHI: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Wednesday flayed the Union government for not controlling the price rise and failing to provide relief to the people from its crushing impact, and promised to organise a mass movement on the issue.
"There has to be a nation-wide struggle. Every citizen should have the right to food and by going to the people with a definite programme and adding strength to the issue, we can convert it into a "jan andolan" [people's movement]," CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat said at the conclusion of a national convention on "For the Right to Food and Against Price Rise."
The day-long convention, organised by the CPI(M) and its affiliated organisations, adopted a resolution demanding that the Public Distribution System (PDS) be made universal, the targeted PDS system be scrapped; provide 35 kg of foodgrains at Rs. 2 a kg; expand the PDS to include pulses, sugar, cooking oil and kerosene at subsidised rates; incorporate all food and nutrition schemes of the Centre; promote national self-sufficiency in production of foodgrains, pulses, sugarcane and oilseeds; and strengthen the PDS.
Mr. Karat said the CPI(M) did not agree with the government's yardstick of delineating people Below and Above Poverty Line. In early 1990s, when India opened its economy, the IMF/World Bank pressured the then Congress government to reduce food subsidy under "structural adjustment." The CPI(M) described the move "as a conspiracy to weaken and finish the PDS."
The CPI(M) "in principle" supported the government's move for a food security legislation, but with alternative proposals.
The resolution, moved by party MP Brinda Karat, registered opposition to proposals such as limiting benefits to the BPL people, slashing family quotas from 35 to 25 kg and raising the issue price from Rs. 2 to Rs. 3 a kg; eliminating all subsidies and access to the PDS for all APL households; and restricting the legal entitlement to rice and wheat and excluding other essential commodities such as sugar, pulses, edible oil and kerosene.
Other speakers at the convention said the decision to permit forward trading resulted in the price rise.
Polit Bureau member Sitaram Yechury said the rise in volumes ran into several lakh crore rupees in the last two years. He demanded a ban on 25 commodities under forward trading.
Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar blamed the policies of successive Congress governments for a situation that even after 62 years of Independence, the country was not able to eliminate hunger and poverty.
West Bengal Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta touched upon the schemes of the State government within available structure to implement alternative polices that resulted in land reforms, increased foodgrain productivity and self-sufficiency and augmenting irrigation.
Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Issac said the State would double the fair price shops.
27 th year of degenerated Left Rule in West Bengal
From Land Reform to Land Scams
-- Sukanta Mondal
Land reforms is gone, land scam is on. Land has always been one of the core agenda for the left parties. But this time it is the other way round in the Left Front, ruled West Bengal. It is not the 'Rural land for the poor', but the 'urban land for the elite'.
The irregularity in the allotment of a plot of land to a former Calcutta High Court judge out of the Chief Minister's discretionary quota has invited the ire of the apex court. The court indicted the judge, Justice Bhagawati Prasad Banerjee for compromising judicial authority to get a plot in the Salt Lake area of Kolkata in 1986. The State Govt. has been asked to evaluate the property constructed over that plot of land and to give the corresponding money to him before taking over the premises within one year. The court has gone on record to comment that 'there is undoubtedly an unholy nexus between the judicial orders and granting order of allotment' by the State Govt. to him.
The court could unfortunately see only the unholy nexus between the judicial orders and the allotment of plots of land in Salt Lake out of the Chief Minister's quota. But the unholy nexus between the chieftains of the chief constituent of the ruling Left Front in the state, the CPI (M) and urban land sharks, the real estate promoters and a horde of mushrooming gang of criminals who sustain and thrive on that nexus, escaped the notice of the court. Even a section of the sports fraternity has been roped into this nexus, who have chosen an alternative playground for themselves for multiplying their sports-gotten unaccounted money.
A series of such incidents hit the headlines recently. First it was the international gold-medal winner athlete-turned Member of Parliament Jyotirmoyee Sikder and her athlete coach Awtar Singh and now the national footballers like Bhaskar Ganguli, Sashthi Duley, Dipankar Roy et al, whose names have come to the fore for having nexus with the criminal gangs backed by the real estate promoters and CPI (M) leaders.
The drama which unfolded in connection with the arrest of notorious criminal hathkata Dilip has unraveled how criminals are exorcising undeterred sway over the affairs of the neo-urbanisation drive in the Dum Dum, Baguiati, Rajarhat, Mahishbathan and Salt Lake areas in the fringe of Kolkata with overt and covert political patronage from their local CPI (M) bosses.
It has also come to light that it is not only hathkata Dilip, but various organized gangs of criminals in different parts of the state, owing allegiance to different senior local CPI (M) leaders, have been working as the frontal force of the grass root state CPI (M) party apparatus for controlling all the profitable economic activities like real estate business, export-oriented fish culture, particularly growing of shrimps, lobsters, etc, brick-field operations etc. These activities involve illegal grabbing of land for which these criminals act as essential tools. And thus goes on the reversed land reforms in West Bengal under the LF rule. The peasants, the poor toiling urban population, the people on the margins are being forcibly evicted from the land in their possession to make room for so-called development and neo-urbanisation composed of high-rises, shopping malls, multiplexes, star hotels, private hospitals and elite schools and colleges to cater to the needs of the upstart rich which have become the new found class base of the 'improved Left Front' today. To appease the people in high places, the industrialists, the top bureaucrats, the judges et al, the LF govt. has distributed plots at lucrative places for a song out of the so-called Chief Minister's quota, which got revealed in the Justice Banerjee-land scam recently.
The degeneration and corruption in party life found passive acknowledgement even in the 20 th West Bengal State CPI (M) conference document. It inter alia stated that:
"There is gap in being firm against the immoral activities connected with urban land, construction of buildings, rural properties; panchayet functioning etc. the question of morality has mainly remained an issue for abstract discussion, wherever specific complaints are received or noticed, there is hesitation or inertia in intervening, making efforts to rectify the things or taking preemptive actions." It is all the more revealing later: "For some time there is an increasing tendency to form voluntary organisations as the own organisations of the party activists which run parallel to the party organisation. The party activists are themselves at the helm of these organisations but at no level – state, district, zonal or local – these are under the party control or leadership. Money is flowing, in big volumes … but the party is in the dark as to the fact that the same is happening in exchange of what. … And spent for what purpose and how much. As a result of being in power, apart from the ministers, there is no dearth of capacity to raise money even for the party leaders, if morality can be sacrificed. "
Despites these pious admissions, things have only worsened during the last there years since the 20 th State Conference. Reports of worst kind of clash of vested interests are pouring in everyday during the local level conference hold prior to the 21 st conference which is just on the cards. Things have come to such a pass that murders are taking place even within the Conference itself. 27 years of Social Democratic rule is thus taking its inevitable toll.
Galaxy's 'cannibalism' revealed | ||||||||||
 The Andromeda galaxy is still expanding The vast Andromeda galaxy appears to have expanded by digesting stars from other galaxies, research has shown. When an international team of scientists mapped Andromeda, they discovered stars that they said were "remnants of dwarf galaxies". The astronomers report their findings in the journal Nature. This consumption of stars has been suggested previously, but the team's ultra-deep survey has provided detailed images to show that it took place. This shows the "hierarchical model" of galaxy formation in action. The model predicts that large galaxies should be surrounded by relics of smaller galaxies they have consumed.
The scientists charted the outskirts of Andromeda in detail for the first time. They discovered stars that could not have formed within the galaxy itself. Pauline Barmby, an astronomer from the University of Western Ontario who was involved in the study, told BBC News the pattern of the stars' orbits revealed their origin. "Andromeda is so close that we can map out all the stars," she said. "And when you see a sort of lump of stars that far out, and with the same orbit, you know they can't have been there forever." Andromeda, which is approximately 2.5 million light years away from Earth, is still expanding, say the scientists. The researchers also saw a "stream of stars" of a nearby galaxy called Triangulum "stretching" towards Andromeda. Dr Scott Chapman, reader in astrophysics at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, was also involved in the research. He said: "Ultimately, these two galaxies may end up merging completely. "Ironically, galaxy formation and galaxy destruction seem to go hand in hand." Nickolay Gnedin, an astrophysicist from the University of Chicago, who was not involved in this study, described the work as showing "galactic archaeology in action". Print Sponsor Advertisement Ads by Google Only F1 Night Race Singapore. Still World's Only F1 Night Race. Win A F1 Experience! www.VisitSingapore.com Pakhtuns/Pashtuns/Afghans Articles on the History, Culture Traditions & Origins of Pakhtun www.pakhtun.com | Advertisement  SEE ALSO RELATED INTERNET LINKS The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites  News feeds
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Ironically, galaxy formation and galaxy destruction seem to go hand in hand 
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Sky diver films 10,000ft fall
The project manager of Vedic Village,
Biplab Biswas, and Kalo Babu alias Kalua, were remanded in judicial custody for 14 days today by the Barasat court. Earlier, both men had been remanded in police custody for questioning.
Food security for all ~ The Mission Calls For A Massive Effort
FAR from achieving self-sufficiency, India's record in the food sector in recent years has been distressing. There has been a sharp decline in crop productivity. During 2008-09, agricultural growth dropped to a dismal 1.6 per cent. A national food security mission has been launched to raise production in respect of rice by 10 million tonnes, wheat by eight million tonnes and pulses by two million tonnes over the next five years.
One comes across reports of starvation deaths from some part of the country or the other. According to a rehydration project report, around seven million children die of hunger every year. It was earlier reported that 63 per cent of the children go to bed hungry and 47 per cent suffer from chronic malnutrition. In recent years, a large number of people has died of starvation and malnutrition in the poverty-stricken regions of Orissa, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra and Himachal Pradesh. Such tragedies confirm that the procedure that is followed to benefit the BPL families through the Public Distribution System is defective and often misused.
The country's food stock in July 2009 stood at around 50 million tonnes of rice and wheat, which may suffice for the current year. But during 2009-10, food production is projected to fall by 5.6 per cent on account of the deficit in rainfall.
Increasing poverty
Poverty and the lack of purchasing power explain why one-third of the country's population is half-fed. And the number is rising. The FAO had earlier estimated that India has 221 million hungry against China's 142 million. The benefits of the poverty alleviation schemes have not reached the target group. Indeed, there is no policy to counter chronic hunger and rural poverty.
The world's population crossed 6.75 billion in January 2009. And to feed a population of 8.9 billion by 2030, the world will require twice the amount of calories consumed today.
The UN agency reported recently that more than one billion are hungry in the poor countries despite a substantial increase in food production in the last two decades. A survey by the US Census Bureau revealed that one in eight Americans live in poverty and some 37 million Americans are below the poverty line. Half a million starvation deaths occurred in North Korea in the recent past. In Indonesia, 450 children die of starvation every day. The FAO has projected that the number of undernourished may decline to 575 million by 2015 and to 400 million by 2040.
It has also been projected that India will be free of poverty, hunger and malnutrition, and will become an environmentally safe country by 2030. Presently, 221 million people in the country are undernourished and more than 360 million are below the poverty line. They are particularly vulnerable to natural disasters. Also, more than 50 per cent of pregnant women are anaemic, and every third child born registers a low birth weight, with the risk of impaired health and brain development. A World Development Report had cautioned that India would not be able to reduce poverty and improve human development by 2015 without socio-economic reforms geared to improve health, education, water supply, sanitation and the power situation.
The World Food Summit in Rome had pledged to provide food security and the universal right of access to safe and nutritious food. It had called for adequate food security for the eradication of hunger in all countries. It had also resolved to reduce the number of undernourished to half by 2015. However, the FAO report on world agriculture observed that the target to reduce the number of hungry by half by 2015 would not even be met by 2030.
Our agriculture is largely dependent on the monsoon. The Economic Survey has projected the food output in 2008-09 at 230 million tonnes. It was 230.8 million tonnes in 2007-08. The scenario for 2009-10 is far from encouraging not least because of the inadequate monsoon in certain states. Food security for all may remain a distant dream. During 2008-09, our population increased to 115.4 crore from 113.8 crore in 2007-08. Therefore, the current food estimates will not be enough to feed the burgeoning population, if the entire half-fed people are fully fed. The rise in population has eaten away the benefits of higher production, and now poses a serious threat to food security.
Increasing food production will depend largely on a good monsoon in successive years, an expansion in the area under cultivation, a rise in productivity and improved cultivation under rainfed and dryland farming. Two-thirds of the net cropped area is under dryland farming, accounting for 42 per cent of the total food produce. We either wait for the miracle seed from abroad or develop the seed and the package of farming ourselves to meet the needs of the population.
The Green Revolution in wheat and rice has now reached a dead end; it has not made an impact on cultivation in the rainfed area and in respect of coarse grains and pulses. Indeed, it has had an adverse effect on agricultural environment. Both qualitative and quantitative has been the degradation of land, water and bio-resources; waterlogging and excessive salinity have rendered fertile lands uncultivable. Post-harvest losses have been substantial.
Tapping potential
THE yields of the newly developed strains of rice and wheat have almost reached a plateau under optimum conditions. Punjab and Haryana have been facing soil health problems in respect of salinity and nutrient imbalance. Both states have exhausted their irrigation potential. Micro-nutrient deficiencies are also a matter of concern. However, there is scope to fully tap the potential of the eastern region stretching from eastern UP to Assam for improving rice productivity. The International Rice Research Institute had cautioned that global warming may be a threat to rice yields.
A second Green Revolution through genetically modified (GM) technology referred to as "gene revolution" is being advocated to improve productivity. But it must be ensured that crop biotechnology products are safe; GM food poses the risk of organ abnormalities. This technology has, however, been accepted by farmers the world over.
It is unfortunate that the right to food has not been accorded the overriding priority as there is hardly any concern over privation and starvation deaths. The working of the PDS needs improvement. The "Antyodaya Anna Yojana" programme has to be expanded to cover rural households and create employment opportunities to enable the poor to buy food.
The task of ensuring food and nutrition to the vast population is challenging, particularly when approximately one-third of our population is under-nourished. It is the responsibility of the state governments to implement poverty-alleviation programmes and prevent starvation and malnutrition deaths, as directed by the Supreme Court. Food procurement needs to be decentralised. This will depend largely on doubling our food production in the next 15 years.
This, in turn, will necessitate an annual growth rate of 4.7 per cent, the present rate being 1.6 per cent. Therefore, massive efforts are needed to increase crop production, improve the rural infrastructure, prevent huge losses and ensure food security for all.
http://www.thestatesman.org/page.news.php?clid=3&theme=&usrsess=1&id=267137
Deb turns sights on Mamata
KOLKATA, 2 SEPT: The state housing minister Mr Gautam Deb (SNS photograph) today skirted the Vedic Village resort scam at what was projected to be a tell-all Press conference, a day after the land and land reforms minister, Mr Rezzak Mollah had given his version of the affair.
Instead, Mr Deb claimed no irregularities or coercion were made for procurement of land for setting up the Rajarhat township.
He said the information technology minister, Mr Debes Das, the chief minister and the CPI-M state secretary, Mr Biman Bose, would speak on the Vedic Village issue. The IT department has been dragged into the controversy over the trade-off it had with the resort management for setting up an IT park on land acquired allegedly under dubious circumstances.
Mr Deb went on the offensive against railway minister Miss Mamata Banerjee and said MLAs ~ sitting and former ~ had been included in committees for procuring land and developing neighbouring areas of Rajarhat. This was in response to Miss Banerjee's charge that it was Mr Deb who had several times asked Trinamul MLA, Mr Arabul Islam, to meet him.
The housing minister blamed the railway minister for stalling projects at New Town at Rajarhat, while her supporters had stopped installation of transformers.
Accepting Miss Banerjee's challenge of competing for development, he said development should be through cooperation and competition and not confrontation. He said several Trinamul leaders had assured him of cooperation, with the rider that he shouldn't leak it out to the Trinamul chief.
At one point he said he didn't know Mr Islam and then admitted the latter had once met him at his office and he advised him to help development work rising above narrow politics. Mr Islam had submitted a development plan for the area worth Rs 74 lakh, but it wasn't cleared as the neighbourhood committee was bypassed, he said.
"As members of all political parties are included in different committees there was no firing or bloodshed while getting land from farmers at Rajarhat," he boasted.
Mr Partha Chatterjee, Leader of the Opposition, said the two Press conferences yesterday and today were the outcome of a clash of interests among state ministers. He alleged about 1.1 million acres of farm land, including thousands of acres for Rajarhat, had been converted into non-agricultural land through coercion during the LF regime. He demanded the state government publish a White Paper on the acquired land. He has also demanded that 400 acres of land at Singur given to the Tatas on lease be returned to the farmers and the government's deal with the Tata Group be made public. SNS
Red rampage in Midnapore
Statesman News Service
MIDNAPORE, 2 SEPT: Villagers had to pay the price for daring to defy a CPI-M diktat not to file any nomination against the party for the upcoming election to the Moula-Paramanandapur Krishi Unnayan Samabayee Samiti (MPKUSS).
About 700 armed activists of the Red brigade went on the rampage in the village for three hours from around 10 a.m. today and exploded bombs to terrorise villagers. They allegedly ransacked several houses and looted valuables worth lakhs. The houses of Mr Bangshi Ghosh and Mr Nimai Ghosh were ransacked and looted. The duo were severely beaten up as they tried to resist the goons. Besides them, Mr Anil Khan and Mr Kshudiram Bag were also beaten up, it was further alleged.
Six Opposition candidates filed their nominations for six seats of the samiti yesterday, the last day of filing nominations. The election to the samiti is slated for 13 September.
Mr Nitai Ghosh is the worst sufferer as a steel almirah, containing gold ornaments and other articles worth over Rs 1 lakh and Rs 10,000 in cash, was looted from his house.
The criminals also tore away a pair of gold earrings from a woman member of Mr Sukumar Ghosh's family, injuring her critically.
Some of the affected villagers called up the Chandrakona police station, asking for immediate deployment of forces to stop CPI-M terror. But their requests fell on deaf ears, thus giving the goons a free run.
It was only when this correspondent drew the attention of the SP, Mr Manoj Verma, around 12 noon to Marxist vandalism, that a contingent from Chandrakona police station arrived at Moula around 1 p.m. Seeing a police jeep approaching the village, the hoodlums fled to Kolla, a CPI-M stronghold, in a neighbouring village. But the goons have eluded police.
While fleeing, the hooligans threatened to return to the village in the evening, after police left, to terrorise inhabitants, residents alleged. They feared that police would not take any action against cadres to let them live in peace as they (visiting police personnel) were seen having tea and snacks in the house of the CPI-M's local committee member, Mr Pradip Ganguly, at Barasat, the adjacent village.
State looks beyond Bengal for potatoes
Statesman News Service
KOLKATA, 2 SEPT: Although the state has enough potatoes for consumption in the cold storages, the state government is looking at other states to procure potatoes and sell it at a subsidised rate. The state agri-marketing minister, Dr Mortozza Hossain today said this after a meeting with cold storage owners.
He said that the potato prices in the state are rising due to increase in labour and transport charges.
In most markets potatoes are selling between Rs 22 and Rs 20 and the state government's attempts to sell potatoes on its own had little impact on the rising prices. Dr Hossain said:" According to our estimates there is no shortage of potatoes for consumption. But we cannot raid the cold storages to get the potatoes for sale. How can we enter other people's property ?" He also said that the state government's plans to sell potatoes from government stalls in unrealistic. There are only 60 stalls which are obviously not enough for the whole state. Dr Hossain also added that he does not have enough manpower to measure out potatoes from cold storages. The minister also said that the state is looking at other states like Punjab to procure potatoes although the prices are not lower than West Bengal. A team of officials from Punjab went to look for potatoes for sale as well as for seeds but they have returned empty handed.
"Potatoes prices in other states are no better than West Bengal but we are trying to get potatoes from other potato growing areas and sell this at a subsidised rate," said Dr Hossain.
According to an official of the food department, potato is on the list of essential commodities but there are legal complications which prevent them from raiding the cold storages.
http://www.thestatesman.org/page.news.php?clid=1&theme=&usrsess=1&id=267119
| HOW THE VEDIC VILLAGE DEAL WAS STRUCK | ||||||
The following information is based on the statements made by Bengal land and land reforms minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah on Tuesday. The information makes it clear that there was no adverse court order that compelled the land department to go in for an out-of-court settlement with the Vedic Village promoters • Between 1997 and 2002, Sanjeevani Projects and other companies had been buying land in Rajarhat for the Vedic Village project • After purchasing 10 acres, they applied for mutation at the office of the Block Land and Land Reforms Officer, Rajarhat • Between 1997 and 2002, much of these 10 acres had been mutated in Sanjeevani's favour • The state government, at the behest of Mollah, conducted an inquiry and found that Sanjeevani had in its possession, in its name and in other names (benami), ceiling-surplus land • According to the land ceiling law, the state government was empowered to conduct investigations into whether there was any benami property and hear out those against whom allegations had been made • Hearings were held with Sanjeevani and associates. It was found that the group was in possession of 76 acres • Law permits a company to have in its possession only up to 24 acres. So, in January 2003, 52 acres (76 acres - 24 acres) were vested (taken over) by the government • In the same month, Sanjeevani filed a case in Calcutta High Court against the government's move to vest 52 acres lOn March 13, 2003, Justice Amitava Lala passed an order saying the petitioners (Sanjeevani) could not change the character of the land; he did not pass any order on whether the vesting should or shouldn't be done. Mollah said on Tuesday that the order "did not say anything about vesting but also didn't nullify vesting'' • On March 27 and May 29, 2003, the state government and the private group made a joint inspection of the site, from which it was found that Justice Lala's order had been flouted — meaning the land character had been changed by Sanjeevani by constructing on it • On September 4, 2003, the state government moved the judiciary with the prayer that a contempt of court order be passed against Sanjeevani for having changed the land character • On September 23, 2003, Sanjeevani made an appearance in the court of Justice Lala and apologised. According to the government, the court disposed of the case by saying that the apology was enough • On September 24, 2003, Sanjeevani filed a writ petition in the court of Justice Jayanta Biswas — once again against the government's vesting; the judge said the matter was not in the high court's jurisdiction and that the petitioner may approach the Land Reforms and Tenancy Tribunal • On September 25, 2003, Sanjeevani went to the tribunal challenging the government's vesting of the land • On September 30, 2003, the tribunal disposed of Sanjeevani's petition and asked it to make an appeal to the North 24-Parganas District Land and Land Reforms Officer • Instead, the private group moved the division bench of Calcutta High Court by filing a writ petition on November 9, 2003, against the vesting of the land • On May 4, 2004, the land department issued an order to allow long-term lease settlements across the state of land which has either been vested after purchase or purchased unknowingly after vesting • On May 2, 2005, Sanjeevani approached the land department saying it wouldn't continue with the court case if the government, on the basis of the May 4, 2004, order, gave it the vested land on long-term lease. The land department agreed, paving the way for the out-of-court settlement • Accordingly, Sanjeevani group associates Stone Mercantile applied for 13.71 acres, Zeon for 14.5 acres and Square Commerce for 15.99 acres from the government on long-term lease • On May 11, 2005, the state government started initiating the long-term lease process for 44.27 acres for the construction of Vedic Village • Through this process, the state government got Rs 97.36 lakh from the Vedic Village consortium
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| From cradle, IT park was on deathbed - Haste takes toll even before Vedic nail | |||
| OUR BUREAU | |||
Calcutta, Sept. 2: Bickering ministers in the Bengal government have started writing the epitaph of the IT township project made infamous by the Vedic Village flare-up but the death knell was sounded the very day the venture was born. In a desperate attempt to create a land bank for potential IT investors, the state government, through its nodal IT agency Webel, entered into an agreement with Vedic Realty and Diamond Group for the 1,200-acre IT township, 600 acres of which were earmarked for IT companies. As part of the agreement on August 25, 2008, Webel would have got the 600 acres free and, in exchange, it was to develop infrastructure for the entire 1,200-acre project. "But the agreement was vague…. It did not peg any project cost or set any deadline on completion. The agreement was even silent on the amount of money to be spent on developing infrastructure," said a senior government official. No planning was done on how a company like Webel, which barely breaks even with annual earnings of around Rs 110 crore, could fund the infrastructure development in a 1,200-acre project. According to estimates, Webel would have had to spend in excess of Rs 500 crore for roads, arteries, sewage lines and facilities for water and power. Special budgetary provisions had to be made for the IT department to fund Webel. Although the contours of the project, christened Kolkata Links, remained blurred, the state government started selling it as a possible destination to potential investors. The state IT department signed memoranda of understanding with Infosys and Wipro and promised to deliver 90 acres each to the IT giants. Last month, IT minister Debesh Das promised at a CII meeting that Infosys and Wipro would be handed over the land by December, though the two companies were not in a hurry to set up campuses in the proposed IT township. "I don't know how the minister could make an announcement like that even before getting the land in the government's possession from the private players," wondered an official in the IT department. According to sources, the private promoters had given a list of their land purchases, totalling 180 acres, to the IT department sometime in May, even though they claimed that they had purchased over 500 acres from farmers in Rajarhat and Bhangar. "Webel was supposed to check the registration, mutation, size and the contiguous nature of the plots mentioned in the list. But even before carrying out the necessary scrutiny, the state government announced that it was ready for the handover," a source said. With the project now getting mired in a political controversy and the main promoter, Raj Modi of Vedic Realty, behind bars, the state IT department is at a loss. "I can only say that we will not be involved in anything that is illegal," said Das, distancing himself from the controversy. He probably meant that the government was in no position to hand over the land to Infosys and Wipro.
This is not the first failure of the government. In 2004, Hidco, an agency under housing minister Gautam Deb's chairmanship, had asked Wipro and Infosys to shell out Rs 2.16 crore an acre, which forced the companies to scout for land elsewhere. The West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation also failed to arrange for land for Infosys in 2006 after the chief minister had asked the industries department to do so. The IT department's next attempt at developing a 350-acre township in Jagadishpur, 3km from Rajarhat, had to be aborted in May 2009 as farmers refused to sell land to the government. Das did not have an answer to questions on what would happen to the commitments the state government had made to Wipro and Infosys. The first-time minister was also silent on what alternative plans the government was drawing up to arrange for land for IT companies. "This particular form of public-private partnership model was ill-conceived and the government unnecessarily spent more than a year banking on it. Now they are stuck as they don't have a Plan B," an official said. The impact of the controversy will affect other industries as the South 24-Parganas district administration has suspended mutation of land. In adjoining North 24-Parganas, mutation has been stalled for the past three months because land-related data are being computerised. | |||
 |
- A Field Survey Report
Kartick Pal
An investigation based on an elaborate questionnaire was carried out during August-September 1996, in 3,381 rural households (covering about 17,000 people) in West Bengal which was planned and executed by the state committee of CPI(ML). The investigation was aimed at keeping abreast with the changes in the contemporary socio-economic profile of different classes in rural society compared to that in 1977 with a special emphasis on tracing the evolution of propertied (landed) sections through 19 years of left rule. Initially it was planned to conduct the investigation in 39 villages spread over 9 gram panchayat (GP) areas of Nadia and Bardhawan districts. But it could be conducted exhaustively only in 18 villages of 8 GPs. In the matter of selection of villages, the most backward ones were taken up and in each village all the families were surveyed (in 17 out of the 18 villages).
Before we go into the analysis of the survey data, a few words, as a prelude, may be useful. Agriculture in West Bengal, despite a certain degree of development is facing a critical saturation. CPI(M) people look pretty complacent with their leaders projecting a limited growth as a unique success story. The leap in productivity, they say, is mainly contributed by the 14,67,000 recorded bargadars (share croppers) and 22,70,000 vested land recipients, i.e., the beneficiaries of the land reforms of the Left Front carried out mainly through the bureaucracy. The leaders basically bank on the rate of increase in productivity in which they supposedly occupy the number one slot in India. But this kind of statistics conceal more than what they reveal, for, West Bengal, a late entrant in the race of green revolution, started improving its farming only in the 80s when the main green revolution states had already registered considerable increase in productivity. As a matter of fact, in terms of quantum of production per acre/hectare, West Bengal lags far behind Punjab, Haryana and Tamil Nadu, and this is what the CPI(M) leaders want to conceal in the shadow of their sieved out statistics.
The slogan "land to the tiller" is propagated by the leftists not as a matter of egalitarianism alone, it is categorically aimed at increasing productivity and that way, the 22,70,000 strong contingent of the beneficiaries of land distribution may, no doubt, have its contribution in the overall agricultural productivity. But how can the projected two-and-a-half to three fold hike of production in 54,00,000 hectares (total arable land in WB) be attributed to only a minute fraction when one keeps in mind that the total volume of land seized and distributed in last three decades amounts to a meagre 7% of the whole? More so, when more than two thirds of that had been seized or redistributed in the late 60s and the leap in production took place in the 80s?
Besides this, what is more disturbing to everyone, and annoying too, is the present subsistence nature of agriculture in large tracts in the state which at least is a testimony to the gradualist, subsistence politics of the social democrats. And this is perhaps the crux of the crisis in which WB agriculture is gasping for a way out. Which course this would further take? If LF fails to promote any revolutionary democratic course of development, which they cannot do within the ambit of present parliamentary democracy, the only logical possibility is a kulak-led capitalist course, leading to a capitalist concentration of land. CPI(M), it appears is prepared to comply with this as fait accompli and they started taking necessary steps to move with the tide. They have already proposed to the President of India to slacken the Urban Land Ceiling Act, diluting land ceilings in rural areas and have very recently been talking about exempting the rich peasantry from the levy, hitherto used to feed the state granary.
| Table I Ownership Pattern | |||||||
| Different classes | Relative position of different classes | Total land holdings by different class categories (in bighas) | Modern Agri-equipments used (a study of 546 families) | ||||
| 1978 | 1996 | Shift | 1978 | 1996 | Shift | ||
| Jotedar (kulak) | 52(1.53%) | 59(1.74%) | 0.21%(+) | 2125(19.1%) | 2073(17.3%) | 1.8%) | 7.6% |
| Rich Peasantry | 173(5.11%) | 201(5.94%) | 0.83%(+) | 3120(28.0%) | 3549(29.6%) | 1.6%(+) | 23.3% |
| Middle Peasantry | 484(14.31%) | 454(13.42%) | 0.89%(-) | 3976(35.7%) | 3416(31.9%) | 3.8%(-) | 41% |
| Poor Peasantry | 739(21.85%) | 865(25.58%) | 3.73%(+) | 1555(14.0%) | 1904(15.9%) | 1.9%(+) | 19.6% |
| Agri-labourers + other toilers | 1933(57.17%) | 1802(53.28%) | 3.89% | 351(3.2%) | 642(5.3%) | 2.1%(+) | 8.5% |
| Total | 3381 | 3381 | |||||
A socio-economic survey at such a critical point will readily generate interest among political workers, theorists and academic researchers. The investigation brings out certain observations on changes in ownership pattern of land, the conditions of the rural poor, distribution of institutional loans and resurgence of usury, and participation of different classes in rural self-government (Panchayats), which speak volumes about the transition of CPI(M)'s class and social base. Below we give some of the findings.
In comparison to 1978 situation only a marginal change in the ownership pattern is seen in 1996. According to data furnished by the Economic and Statistical Department, Government of West Bengal, despite some amount of trimming of the big holdings, number of owners holding more than 10 acres of land remains the same in the 90s as in the pre-1978 period. Our investigation shows an increase in the number of both jotedars (kulaks, who own 30 bighas of land) and rich peasants (who own from 15-30 bighas) who also use more than 30% of modern agri-machinery. Thus, a continuation of gradual strengthening of the position of the rural rich is seen. As far as the lowest rungs are concerned, we see a slight decline in the landless and other toilers category (who own 0.1-1 bighas). With the poor peasants (who own 1-3 bighas, and are basically toilers too) taken together, the rural poor constitutes the largest cross-section of the rural population and has swelled up in the LF rule. The maximum differentiation and flux has been experienced by the middle peasants about 14.8% of whom, through an upward mobility, have transformed themselves into rich peasants and 1.2% into jotedars, while more a formidable section has slipped into lower categories, 16% to poor peasantry and 4% to the landless. Such tension in this section is shaped by the constraints of production on the one hand and political allegiance on the other. Capital crunch is a constant problem for this section all through which has been further aggravated by the unprecedented rise in fertilizer and fuel prices in recent years.
The section from amongst them eventually gaining an upward mobility has been seen to have the right political connections (i.e. CPI(M) and in some cases, other LF constituents) and links with the administration, drawing the major chunk of the institutional support, which we shall deal separately in this report. And the reverse is true for those going down. The most well-off sections show a fair degree of constancy with a small portion going down the ladder to the middle peasantry, but subsequently being more than compensated by a stronger counter-current. This means, the traditional holdings in the state have been maintained undisturbed in 19 years of left rule.
The investigation shows an expansion of the poor peasantry and a little shrinkage in the volume of agricultural labourers. Well, a small piece of vested land received by an agricultural labourer may turn him into a poor peasant, but immediately he does not cease to be an agricultural labourer in a practical sense, for he has to earn livelihood for more than half the year by selling labour power in others' land. Viewed in this perspective, the actual increase in total member of toiling people in rural society, a resulting shrinkage of jobs and a stagnation of agricultural production after a certain degree of development, unveils the contemporary crisis-ridden picture of West Bengal agriculture.
The Left Front, while being voted to power in 1977 had promised to free the rural society from the yoke of usury and perhaps some changes were effected in that direction through a certain reinvigoration of agricultural co-operatives, which the LF called 'co-operative movement' with a bit of euphemism. But with elements of green revolution creeping in West Bengal countryside, agriculture gradually became extremely demanding of capital. In spite of the state agencies like DRDA and banks, as part of government projects such as JRY, forwarding loans for agriculture, usury is gaining currency in the countryside particularly afflicting the weaker categories of the peasantry. The euphemism of the co-operative movement has by now been rendered almost irrelevant by the dynamics of a late green revolution in a 'red' bastion as the amount disbursed through cooperatives (as can be seen from Table-I) is simply no match to the real demand. In the limited scope of our investigation, it was found that of the total amount of money drawn by the 3,381 families under survey, 8.9% comes from cooperatives, 23.3% from the usurers and 67.8% from the banks.
Corruption, an institutionalised affair in the cooperatives, has led to closure of many. In the running ones, predominance of the richer sections in governing bodies is the prevailing reality. In Table-II, we see that the major share of cooperative loan (63%) is swindled by the jotedar, rich peasant and middle peasant families (21% in all), along with 35% of the total bank loan and 38.4% from usury; whereas poor peasant, agricultural labourers and other toiling families (78.8% in all) have to depend more on usury. They account for 61% of usurious loans, 37% cooperative loans and 65% bank loans. How could things come to such a pass?
| Table II Distribution of loans among different classes | ||||||||||
| Class | No of Families | Total amount of usury loan (Rs.) | Takers of usury loan | Averge amount per family (Rs.) | Total Co.op. loan (Rs.) | Taker of Co. op. loan | Average amount per family (Rs.) | Total amount of Bank loan (Rs.) | Takers of Bank loan | Average amount per family (Rs.) |
| Jotedar | 59 | 10,000 | 1 | 10,000 | 2,91,000 | 6 | 48,500 | 4,38,000 | 11 | 39818.18 |
| Rich peasant | 201 | 2,82,100 | 28 | 10,075 | 1,02,900 | 23 | 4473.9 | 5,96,000 | 23 | 12,163.26 |
| Middle peasant | 454 | 6,15,200 | 90 | 6835.5 | 1,78,600 | 57 | 3133.3 | 13,93,700 | 178 | 7829.77 |
| Poor peasant | 865 | 4,71,000 | 132 | 3568.18 | 1,50,700 | 85 | 1772.9 | 15,94,600 | 219 | 7887.32 |
| Agri-labourer | 1384 | 7,11,100 | 214 | 33,22,89 | 1,08,900 | 65 | 1675.3 | 24,10,500 | 359 | 6714.48 |
| Other toilers | 418 | 2,77,000 | 45 | 6155.55 | 76,500 | 10 | 7650 | 4,54,000 | 67 | 6776.11 |
| Total | 3381 | 23,66,4000 | 510 | 9,08,600 | 246 | 68,86,8 | 883 | |||
Cooperatives have never challenged the existing marketing system by building up an alternative cooperative marketing mechanism. It could never succeed in providing real relief to the poor. In the absence of a proper marketing mechanism, the small and poor peasants cannot make enough profit and as a result default in timely repayment and once they default, they are naturally excluded from the ambit of the scheme. In this way the poorer sections are gradually being cast outside the domain of all institutional help and the richer ones are tightening their grip over these institutions. It has been experienced in some cases that influential persons in the cooperative bodies are drawing 'loans' indiscriminately to fund personal usury 'business' which is perhaps the most lucrative one these days. Even bank loans are being utilised this way making a mockery of the 'democratisation of cooperatives'.
| Table III Class-wise composition of Panchayat members | ||
| Classes | 1978 | 1996 |
| Jotedar | 7.0% | 10.2% |
| Rich peasant | 14.4% | 16.0% |
| Middle peasant | 28.3% | 26.4% |
| Other middle classes | 20% | 24.4% |
| Poor peasant | 17.4% | 13.2% |
| Agri-labourer | 8.4% | 5.9% |
| Other toilers | 4.5% | 3.9% |
Panchayats in West Bengal were supposed to be the most democratic of all self-governments in India. Yet, particularly in such grassroots institutions holding regular elections cannot be the only or the major yardstick of democracy. Marxists would judge the thing against a different yardstick which is based on an analysis of class composition. A survey of 201 panchayat members in 9 gram panchayats was conducted. (see Table-III)
Table-III gives us a sad picture belying all LF claims of proletarianisation of West Bengal panchayats. We find in our reports that 68.7% of the members were jotedars, rich peasants, middle peasants and other rural middle class families (including school teachers who are among the most well off sections in the countryside nowadays) while 31.3% came from lower middle class, poor peasant and agricultural labourer families in 1978. The corresponding figures in 1996 stand at 77% and 23% respectively. Further, an increase of 3.2% and 1.6% of jotedars and rich peasants has been registered at the expense of poor peasants and agri-labourers whose numbers have reduced by 4.2% and 2.5%. The picture tells us that in spite of the fact that panchayat movement did have a good deal of mass involvement in its early days, the initial gains have, after 19 years, petered out and the rich people have strengthened their position in these institutions of self-governance. The State Panchayat Institute (an organisation of the state government), in a survey after the 1993 panchayat elections, had pointed out the predominance of rich peasants and businessmen in panchayat samitis and zilla parishads (the upper two tiers of the three tier system). The lowest body i.e. the gram panchayats, according to them were controlled by the poorer sections. Our investigation, on the contrary, portrays a different scenario, one of increase in number of rich people at all three levels.
It is however true that in some villages, panchayats had effectively curbed the power and clout of some rank reactionary jotedars who used to dominate village society. But the LF has nothing much to claim as to whether these initial steps were extended deep enough to overhaul the traditional class domination.
As far as developmental activity is concerned, the panchayats operate exclusively within the limits of central-government-sponsored projects of which they are mere implementing agencies. Such projects, aimed at an 'all-are-in' development of the countryside, have naturally no 'class-bias' and include construction/repair of roads, small bridges and school buildings, housing for SCs & STs, setting up tubewells, rural electrification etc. Going by the experiences of yesteryear it can be said that road construction was given the primary attention resulting in a betterment of rural communication network, leaving out all other agendas unattended and the outcome 'eventually' came in handy for the rural neo-rich businessmen and rich peasants who are in a position to exploit the system the best.
Complaints of corruption have of late been a commonplace affair in villages and panchayats today are no exception. How much of it is institutionalised in local self-government may be gauged from the fact that in a mass meeting about one and a half years back at Bardhawan, an irate Mr. Benoy Chowdhury (the then land and land reforms minister) openly took a dig at the reign of contractors which he said had overwhelmed rural Bengal. And remarkably, he didn't stop there, rather pursues his indictment, even at the cost of his ministerial berth. Quite evidently his target was the unholy nexus between the panchayat leaders and contractors in executing developmental programmes. According to an estimate a meagre Rs. 7 lakh is allotted for each GP and if contractors are allowed to carve out a percentage as profits, and another percentage goes to the corrupt leaders as 'commission' as a matter of rule, its not hard to visualise the real picture of development!
To sum up, let us put together all the observations we collected so far. We find in it more or less a continuation of the same ownership pattern as in 1978 with minor changes. As far as loans and modern agricultural implements are concerned, a concentration of the same is seen in the hands of the creamy layers. The only hope for the downtrodden, the agricultural co-operatives have been rendered sick and ineffective partly by the market forces and partly by the overt corrupt practices of the influential people who hold the sway over the panchayat at different levels. Contrary to the LF claim of domination of the poor peasantry and the landless in the panchayats, our investigation reveals a tightening grip of the rich over the panchayats at the expense of the poor. The hike of production in the state is attributed by CPI(M) to the beneficiaries of the land reform, i.e. the landless and the poor peasants. But it is a common experience that these sections are already thrown to the margins of production with agriculture becoming capital intensive and usurers fastening their noose around the rural poor. Hamstrung by umpteen fragmentations of land and a capital crunch, the basic concern for these sections is subsistence and not furtherance of production. The LF leaders instead of patting their own back would do better to implement the minimum wages act in West Bengal countryside which they have not done so far and that would be the good revelation of the real class nature of the 'uniquely' prolonged left rule in a province under the overall bourgeois hegemonic structure.
| Deb reveals 'inclusive' model and rift | ||
| OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT | ||
Calcutta, Sept. 2: Housing minister Gautam Deb today said the government and the CPM were "seriously concerned'' about Vedic Village's land deals as the "mafia" was at work there, and contrasted them with the way in which plots were taken in Rajarhat by his department. "No guns and goons were used in New Town," Deb said. "Ours was a policy of inclusion, where every political party had a role to play in acquiring the land so development work moved ahead easily." He did not name Abdur Rezzak Mollah, but spoke of his "distaste" for the manner in which the land and land reforms department had handled the Vedic Village deals. "Around 6,807 acres in Rajarhat are under the possession of Hidco (Housing Infrastructure Development Corporation), of which 250 acres were directly purchased while the rest was acquired," Deb said. "While doing this, we didn't require lathis, tear gas or bullets as I had involved all political parties in the development committees formed. We didn't allow goondas to rule the roost. But it appears there was some foul play in the case of Vedic Village because of the presence of land sharks.'' As an extension of his policy of "inclusive development", Deb sought co-operation and not confrontation with Mamata Banerjee for state projects. "For me, there should be co-operation and competition. I want a programme of mine to be attended by Pranab Mukherjee, Mamata and our chief minister," he said. Asked about allegations of coercion when he took land in Rajarhat, Deb said: "There was no coercion. There were court cases but Hidco won all of them." With his statement on Vedic Village, Deb officially brought to the surface the "differences" between him and Mollah on the crucial issue of land, political circles said. Mollah has invited criticism from sections of the government and the CPM for his out-of-court settlement with the promoters of Vedic Village and handing them over 44 acres of government land at a throwaway price. Deb refused to be drawn into it today. "He is a senior minister and party leader. He runs the land department and knows it better than me. Rezzakda has submitted a report to our party. We will go through it, discuss it and let you know our views. The government will speak from Writers' Buildings," he told a news conference at his New Secretariat office. On Mollah's demand that the proposed IT township on 1,200 acres involving the Vedic promoters and a government agency be scrapped, the housing minister said: "We have to discuss it in the party. But if… unfair practices are adopted in land deals, the project will have to be scrapped." Deb, who has his differences with Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee as well, today sounded as one expressing confidence in the chief minister's handling of the Vedic fiasco. "The chief minister can't always talk to the media on various issues. But his attitude on Vedic Village is manifest in the statements of the chief secretary and the home secretary. The chief minister has said all details pertaining to the resort will be unearthed. He has made it clear that the government will go to any length for this." Political observers interpreted Deb's "praise" for Bhattacharjee as a bid to taint Mollah's image in the party and mar his chances of moving up its hierarchy. Deb criticised Mamata for having questioned his phone calls to the Trinamul Congress MLA from Bhangar, Arabul Islam. "Arabul is the chairman of the Rajarhat-South 24-Parganas Neighbourhood Development Committee and has got projects worth Rs 22 lakh cleared by Hidco. What's wrong if he comes to us for development work?" he asked. |
| Vedic's wellness friend | ||||||||||||||
| OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT | ||||||||||||||
Calcutta, Sept. 1: No explicit court order was issued against the state government's takeover of Vedic Village land, minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah revealed today, unwittingly striking at the very root of the defence for handing over vested plots to the resort. Besides, the rate at which the land was leased to the promoters of the resort was far lower than not only the then prevailing price but also what the government had charged establishments like hospitals several years earlier. The revelations emerged ironically because of a long media conference held by Mollah, the land and land reforms minister who had cast himself as a vocal critic of the government's policy of acquiring farmland for industry and who is now at the centre of the Vedic Village land controversy. Despite the absence of a clear-cut court order, Mollah's department did not pursue the case against the Vedic Village promoters. Instead, it handed them more than 44 acres at a throwaway price through an out-of-court settlement. Sanjeevani Projects, the original promoter of Vedic Village, had moved Calcutta High Court in January 2003 against the government's decision to vest a large portion of the land the promoters had bought on the ground that the size exceeded the prescribed land ceiling figure. Justice Amitava Lala did not pass an order on the vesting but had restrained Sanjeevani from changing the character of the land. "The order did not say anything about vesting but also didn't nullify vesting,'' Mollah said today. Later, in November 2003, when Sanjeevani moved a division bench of the same court, once again praying for an order against the vesting of their land, Mollah's department agreed to the settlement before the court could pass any order. "So, it's clear that the government had no legal compulsions to strike the deal with Sanjeevani. Rather, it could have waited for the division bench verdict. Had it gone against the government, it could have moved the Supreme Court to try its luck again,'' a land department official said. Asked about this, Mollah said: "I have experience of cases lying in the Supreme Court. They take 25 to 30 years to pass an order. During that time, I would have witnessed the company going ahead with construction. Instead, the government got 95 per cent of the cost of purchase of land that amounted to Rs 97 lakh.'' For a minister sworn in to uphold the law, fighting shy of courts citing inordinate delay is an unusual argument. Besides, the government that Mollah represents is not exactly known for getting things done on time. As for the Rs 97 lakh lease money, the amount is peanuts, compared with what the promoters themselves had been charging buyers of plots in the Vedic Village complex to build bungalows. The price the buyers were paying the promoters in 2001 — four years before Mollah's department reached the settlement — was Rs 50,000 a cottah, against the Rs 3,670 a cottah the Vedic promoters paid the government upfront. The low rate for the resort land becomes starker when compared with what facilities like hospitals had to pay. In the early nineties, Duncan Gleneagles had paid Rs 3 crore to the Calcutta Metropolitan Development Authority for 8.5 acres to build the Apollo hospital. That translates into Rs 35.29 lakh an acre, against the Rs 2.20 lakh an acre the government got more than a decade later from a resort which involves little public interest. The Apollo land is much closer to the city and will command a higher price but the differential highlights the fact that a resort was showered with more favours than a hospital. Besides the lease amount of Rs 97 lakh, the Vedic promoters have to pay Rs 88,000 a year as rent for 99 years for the 44 acres. Even if this spread-out cumulative amount is taken into account, the total cost will add up to only Rs 1.84 crore, far lower than what the promoters gain from buyers of the plots. Mollah said he had been to the Vedic Village spa a "good number of times". He said the out-of-court settlement with the Vedic promoters had to be made as the government had issued an order to have a long-term lease for vested land which had been unknowingly bought by people in different parts of the state. He cited land around Peerless Hospital, which was vested but unknowingly purchased by people. "How can we allow them to suffer?'' Mollah asked. But the Vedic case was different. The promoters had bought land in excess of the ceiling, following which the surplus land was vested, and cannot claim the status of "unknowing" buyers. "The use of the same model can only be termed blatant benevolence," an official said.
|
The new measure is among the additions to the existing Anti-Money L a u n d e r i n g Standards/Combating Financing of Terrorism/obligations of securities market intermediaries under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.
Registered intermediaries, irrespective of the amount of transaction or the threshold limit envisaged for predicate offences specified under PMLA, 2002, have been asked to file a suspicious transaction report (STR) if they have 'reasonable grounds' to believe that the transactions involve proceeds of crime.
The regulator also re-classified the definition of 'politically exposed persons' (PEP) under its list of 'clients of special category' (CSC) as individuals who are or have been entrusted with prominent public functions in a foreign country, eg, heads of states or of governments, senior politicians, senior government/judicial/military officers , senior executives of stateowned corporations, important political party officials, etc.
The additional norms applicable to PEP would also be applied to the accounts of the family members or close relatives of PEPs. Sebi has also amended a clause under suspicious transaction monitoring & reporting to "unusual transactions by CSCs and businesses undertaken by, offshore banks/financial services, businesses reported to be in the nature of export-import of small items."
It also added a new clause under suspicious transaction monitoring and reporting, but relating to the "clients of special category ," whereby intermediaries have been directed that such clients should also be subject to appropriate counter measures. These may include a further enhanced scrutiny of transactions, enhanced relevant reporting mechanisms or systematic reporting of financial transactions , and applying enhanced due diligence while expanding business relationships with the identified country or persons in that country, etc.
Registered intermediaries have also been directed to ensure that names of the proposed customer does not appear in the updated list of individuals and entities, which are subject to various sanction measures such as freezing of assets/accounts, denial of financial services, etc, as approved by the Security Council Committee.
| SAIL awaits sops from Bengal | ||
| JAYANTA ROY CHOWDHURY | ||
New Delhi/Burnpur, Sept. 2: Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) feels the capacity of the Rs 14,440-crore under-construction IISCO steel plant can be jacked up to 5 million tonnes from the proposed 2.9 mt if the Bengal government provides the promised tax concessions. Two years back, when the IISCO modernisation was approved, Bengal had assured the SAIL subsidiary of tax sops. However, the concessions have not been notified by the state as yet. Steel ministry officials are unhappy with the state government's tardiness in implementing the promised sales tax and VAT deferrals for 5 years from April 1, 2008. "IISCO could in time be developed into a 5mt steel plant. We have scope for such developments in the future," said SAIL chief S.K. Roongta. The Rs 44,000-crore steel giant wants to attain a capacity of 26mt by 2012 and is looking at Bengal for major expansion. Udyog Bhawan, home to the steel ministry, has been insisting that SAIL pursue the Bengal government's promised tax benefits. Last year, Nilotpal Roy, then IISCO managing director, had written a letter to West Bengal industry minister Nirupam Sen seeking "waiver of sales tax, exemption from payment of electricity duty, royalty, cess for a period of 5 years from April 1, 2008". An almost identical letter had been sent by his successor S.P. Rao on August 3 this year seeking the same concessions. However, no answers have come from the state. Steel ministry officials say Adhunik, JSW and other steel makers who have just signed memorandums of understanding with Bengal have already been given similar sops. "It's just PSUs who get left out. Here we are reviving an ailing pride of Bengal by building a brand new plant on which work is going on in full swing and we get no support from the state government. Private players on the other hand seem to get all concessions they seek," top officials said. SAIL is building India's single largest blast furnace at IISCO, Burnpur, with capacity to melt up to 2.9 mt of steel. The technology comes from SAIL's Korean rival Posco. Larsen & Toubro is the main civil contractor, while the designs of the facilities are by Italy's Danieli. Officials said that SAIL might be the only major investor in metals in Bengal for the next few years, with plans to spend more than Rs 18,000 crore. Elaborate plans drawn up by private entities such as Jindal Steel, Bhushan Steel and Videocon to invest nearly Rs 100,000 crore have remained only on paper. Smaller plants making construction bars have been the only real investment in metals. In addition to IISCO, the PSU will invest Rs 3,500 crore in Durgapur Steel Plant, Alloy Steels Plant and metal works facilities at Kulti. Bengal is a favoured destination in steel because of abundant availability of coal, good rail and road linkages with the rest of the country and the Haldia port. The iron ore mines in Orissa and Jharkhand are also nearby. However, the slowdown has forced most major steel makers to put on hold their expansion plans. Besides, steel makers such as ArcelorMittal and Posco are facing long delays in Orissa and Jharkhand because of red tape. | ||
|
Great potential awaits full realisation
When women play a more prominent role in panchayats, they bring new priorities to the rural bodies which did not
get due attention
earlier, says BHARAT DOGRA
On 27 August, the Union Cabinet gave its approval to enhancing reservation of women up to 50 per cent in all the three tiers of panchayats across the country. Earlier 33 per cent reservation for women was introduced by the 73rd constitutional amendment. Although a few states subsequently moved towards the goal of 50 percent reservation, the proposed constitutional amendment is certainly a big step forward.
In the course of my travels to remote villages I've met several women who have played a very admirable role in speeding up development as well as initiating wider social change after having been elected as village head-persons (or occupying other posts in panchayati raj institutions). At the same time, we cannot ignore the other side, that in numerous cases male members of their family or officials reduced them to mere rubber-stamp.
On the one hand, some women from weaker sections have overcome both gender and caste-cum-class adversities to bring many-sided benefits to their villages, particularly the poorer families. On the other hand, we've cases of such women being harassed, victimised, unjustly removed from their post or even killed by the entrenched vested interests.
The challenge before us is to create conducive conditions in which honest, independent, assertive women have more chances of being elected, and after election can function in a free and effective way. This is a part of the wider process of making panchayats truly democratic and freeing them from dominance by corrupt and exploitative forces. The other part is more gender-specific as better conditions have to be created in which women can play a wider social role and there is greater acceptance of the same.
The work of some of the women panchayat representatives whom I met during the last decade or so has been truly inspiring. In Chandan panchayat of Chhattis-garh, Radhikabai, a woman from a former bonded labour family, surprised everyone by getting elected as the village sarpanch.
Helped by an organisation of recently released bonded workers Radhikabai succeeded in implementing many development work such as deepening of tanks and construction of school building. When this writer reached the remote village after covering a long difficult route from the district headquarters, several villagers, particularly from weaker sections, testified to the important contribution made by Radhikabai and women panchs Sushila, Dunki and Bunda in the village's development.
Some released bonded workers were now more hopeful of getting land (as recommended by the Supreme Court) following the active work done by Radhikabai to advance their claim on land. However, what Radhika herself regarded as her greatest achievement was the closure of a liquor shop in the village. "This helped to bring down liquor consumption as well as frequent quarrels in the village," Radhika said.
Radhadevi of Meethiberi panchayat (Deh-radun district) overcame stiff resistance from influential resourceful villagers who were all too willing to distribute liquor and money among villagers to buy votes. Radhadevi not only won the first election for village pradhan at a time when her constituency was reserved for women candidates, but she followed this with a second success when such a reservation for woman did not exist in her constituency.
In her two tenures as village pradhan, Radhadevi speeded up a wide range of development work. When a road allocated for her village was illegally diverted elsewhere, she waged a determined struggle to get this shifted back to her village. As she told me later, "Otherwise some villagers would have said that they lost the road because the pradhan, being a woman, proved weaker."
As I talked to several families in the village, I realised the extent to which several needy families had been helped by the initiatives taken by Radhadevi. Ramrati Yadav, a child widow who is now quite old, said: "She is the only person in the village who visits me regularly and to whom I can go any time."
Ramrati described how Radhadevi had been running around to arrange old-age pension and Indira-awas house for her.
Radhadevi was assisted by Seema and other women panchs. In fact, this village reposed high faith in the ability of women by electing women to six out of seven panchayat posts. And the results were rewarding in the form of successful development work and increased social harmony to which Radhadevi and her team have made an important contribution.
Suraiya Begum and Rajjo formed an interesting team of elected members for the semi-urbanised village of Sultanpur Chilkana in Saharanpur district. Suraiya (who later died tragically at a relatively young age) was from a traditional Muslim family in which it was not the custom for women to play a major role in public affairs. Rajjo, a Dalit, came from a family whose traditional livelihood was repairing shoes, a task still carried on by her husband. However when they got an opportunity to work together for the uplift of their village, with the support of some social activists, they were really able to speed up the development work. They complemented each other's work as Suraiya met needy women in her home, while Rajjo went from door to door to meet people. They started with an indebted nagar panchayat and carried it to a stage where it won an award as a model nagar panchayat.
Training programmes for newly elected women members can play a very important role in sensitising them about their rights and responsibilities, as well as equip them to discharge their responsibilities in an effective way.
Although an exceptionally capable woman like
Radhadevi has played an important role without the help of any people's movement or voluntary organisation, in several other cases such support has helped in the success of elected women representatives in village.
Therefore, the role of voluntary organisations and people's movements, including women's organisations, in the training and overall support of elected women representatives should be encouraged.
Women representatives are frequently able to emphasise those priorities which may not be given the same importance by male members. For example, in Chandan panchayat, Radhikabai, with the help of mainly village women, was able to give a lot of importance to driving away a liquor vend from this village. Several people in this village agreed that this may not have received the same importance from male members.
In Meethiberi, Radhadevi has played an important role in solving village level conflicts in an amicable way. Several villagers speak admiringly of her ability to resolve these conflicts.
So, it is true that when women play a more prominent role in panchayats, they also bring new priorities to the rural bodies which were not getting the due attention earlier. There is also an increasing tendency to rise above petty rivalries and work together for the welfare of the village. Many women in villages having women pradhans said that now it is much easier for them to approach someone who can understand their problems and is likely to listen to them sympathetically.
So in numerous ways ~ big and small ~ women's problems have a better chance of being heard. A recent report said that a women's toilet was badly needed near a bus stop but was ignored for several years. But when a woman was elected as pradhan, this was one of the first work approved by her.
From other places there are reports that in development priorities men tend to emphasise cash returns, while women give more importance to nutrition, health, drinking water and protection of forests/trees. Thus, greater and effective participation of women in panchayats can play an important role in bringing to fore important issues like environment protection, maternity care and child nutrition.
The writer is Fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences, New Delhi. He has received the Sarojini Naidu Award for his writings on women in panchayats
http://www.thestatesman.org/page.news.php?clid=4&theme=&usrsess=1&id=267140
Land reform
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2009) |
Land reforms (also agrarian reform, though that can have a broader meaning) is an often-controversial alteration in the societal arrangements whereby government administers possession and use of land. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed real estate property redistribution, generally of agricultural land, or be part of an even more revolutionary program that may include forcible removal of an existing government that is seen to oppose such reforms.
Throughout history, popular discontent with land-related institutions has been one of the most common factors in provoking revolutionary movements and other social upheavals. To those who labor upon the land, the landowner's privilege of appropriating a substantial portion —in some cases half or even more— of production without making a commensurate contribution to production may seem a rank injustice. Consequently, land reform most often refers to transfer from ownership by a relatively small number of wealthy (or noble) owners with extensive land holdings (e.g. plantations, large ranches, or agribusiness plots) to individual ownership by those who work the land. Such transfer of ownership may be with or without consent or compensation; compensation may vary from token amounts to the full value of the land. The land value tax advocated by Georgists is a moderate, market-based version of land reform.
This definition is somewhat complicated by the issue of state-owned collective farms. In various times and places, land reform has encompassed the transfer of land from ownership — even peasant ownership in smallholdings — to government-owned collective farms; it has also, in other times and places, referred to the exact opposite: division of government-owned collective farms into smallholdings. The common characteristic of all land reforms is modification or replacement of existing institutional arrangements governing possession and use of land.
Contents[hide] |
[edit] Land ownership and tenure
 | This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2009) |
The variety of land reform derives from the variety of land ownership and tenure. Among the possibilities are:
- Traditional land tenure, as in the indigenous nations or tribes of North America in the Pre-Columbian era.
- Feudal land ownership, through fiefdoms
- Life estate, interest in real property that ends at death.
- Fee tail, hereditary, non-transferable ownership of real property.
- Fee simple. Under common law, this is the most complete ownership interest one can have in real property.
- Leasehold or rental
- Rights to use a commons
- Sharecropping
- Easements
In addition, there is paid agricultural labor — under which someone works the land in exchange for money, payment in kind, or some combination of the two — and various forms of collective ownership. The latter typically takes the form of membership in a cooperative, or shares in a corporation, which owns the land (typically by fee simple or its equivalent, but possibly under other arrangements). There are also various hybrids: in many communist states, government ownership of most agricultural land has combined in various ways with tenure for farming collectives.
Additionally there are, and have been, well-defined systems where neither land nor the houses people live in are their personal property (Statare, as defined in Scandinavia).
The peasants or rural agricultural workers who are usually the intended primary beneficiaries of a land reform may be, prior to the reform, members of failing collectives, owners of inadequate small plots of land, paid laborers, sharecroppers, serfs, even slaves or effectively enslaved by debt bondage.
[edit] Arguments for and against land reform
| | This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2009) |
Land reform policies are generally advocated as an effort to eradicate food insecurity and rural poverty,[1] often with utilitarian (i.e., "the greatest good for the greatest number"), philosophical or religious (see Biblical Jubilee) arguments, a right to dignity, or a simple belief that justice requires a policy of "land to the tiller". However, many of these arguments conflict with prevailing notions of property rights in most societies and states. Implementations of land reform generally raise questions about how the members of the society view the individual's rights and the role of government.
These questions include:[original research?]
- Is private property of any sort legitimate?
- If so, is land ownership legitimate?
- If so, are historic property rights in this particular state and society legitimate?
- Even if property rights are legitimate, do they protect absolutely against expropriation, or do they merely entitle the property owner to partial or complete compensation?
- How should property rights be weighed against rights to life and liberty?
- Who should adjudicate land ownership disputes?
- At what level of government is common land owned?
- What constitutes fair land reform?
- What are the internal and external political effects of the land reform?
Concern over the value of land reform is based upon the following:[original research?]
- Lack of consistent track record to support land reform outcome, especially when carried out under corrupt auspices or resulting in collective or socialized ownership (rather than smallholder title); for example, in Zimbabwe, an "aggressive" "land reform" plan[2] has led to a collapse of the economy and 45 percent malnutrition. This is in contrast to land reform in Taiwan and South Korea, for example, that took place after WW II and preceded a multi-decade economic boom that turned relatively poor third-world economies into advanced industrialized first-world economies.
- Question of experience and competence of those receiving land to use it productively
- Equity issues of displacing persons who have sometimes worked hard in previous farming of the land
- Question of competence of governmental entities to make decisions regarding agricultural productivity
- Question of miring a country in vast legal disputes from arbitrary property distribution
- Demotivation of any property owners to invest in land that ultimately can be seized
Opposing libertarian arguments maintain that government-directed "land reform" is just a euphemism for theft, and argue that stealing is still stealing regardless of whether property was originally unjustly obtained, or what any group of non-owners (of the property in question) may succeed in obtaining via government intermediary. Consequently, such policies cannot ever be just.[3] So-called "willing seller, willing buyer" programs also invariably involve governments buying land with tax money (which may or may not have been disproportionately collected from those whose land is the subject of the planned reform), and sometimes laws granting government first right to buy land for re-sale (thereby diminishing the market value of the land by eliminating competing buyers). An element of coercion thus exists in these programs despite the "willing" label.
The opposition for a land reform may also be based on other ideologies than modern-day liberalism. In countries where there has traditionally been no private land ownership (e.g. Russia in 19th century) the opposition for reforms enabling the creation of private farms may use nationalistic arguments, proposing that the private farms are inconsistent with the national culture. In countries where the established church was an important land owner, theological arguments have been used in the debate on privatization or nationalization of that land (e.g. 16th century Sweden). The right to ownership of the land, and sometimes, the persons residing on that land, has also been argued on the theory of right of conquest, implying that the original ownership was transferred to the land-owning class's ancestors in a just war. The ownership can also be argued on the ground of god-given right, implying that a supernatural power has given the land to its owners.
For the proponents of the reform, the rights of the individuals for whose good the reform is supposed to work trump the property rights of the land owners. Usually their philosophical background differs significantly from the viewpoints outlined above, spanning from Marxism to religious ideologies. What is common for them, is that they see the rights or duties advocated as more important than a right to own real estate.
[edit] Land reform efforts
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Agrarian land reform has been a recurring theme of enormous consequence in world history — see, for example, the history of the Semproninan Law or Lex Sempronia agraria proposed by Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus and passed by the Roman Senate (133 BC), which led to the social and political wars that ended the Roman Republic.
A historically important source of pressure for land reform has been the accumulation of significant properties by tax-exempt individuals or entities. In ancient Egypt, the tax exemption for temple lands eventually drove almost all the good land into the hands of the priestly class, making them immensely rich (and leaving the world a stunning legacy of monumental temple architecture that still impresses several millennia later), but starving the government of revenue. In Rome, the land tax exemption for the noble senatorial families had a similar effect, leading to Pliny's famous observation that the latifundia (vast landed estates) had ruined Rome, and would likewise ruin the provinces. In the Christian world, this has frequently been true of churches and monasteries, a major reason that many of the French revolutionaries saw the Catholic Church as an accomplice of the landed aristos. In the Moslem world, land reforms such as that organized in Spain by al-Hurr in 718 have transferred property from Muslims to Christians, who were taxable by much higher rates.
In the modern world and in the aftermath of colonialism and the Industrial Revolution, land reform has occurred around the world, from the Mexican Revolution (1917; the revolution began in 1910) to Communist China to Bolivia (1952, 2006) to Zimbabwe and Namibia. Land reform has been especially popular as part of decolonization struggles in Africa and the Arab world, where it was part of the program for African socialism and Arab socialism. Cuba has seen one of the most complete agrarian reforms in Latin America. Land reform was an important step in achieving economic development in many Third World countries since the post-World War II period, especially in the East Asian Tigers and "Tiger Cubs" nations such as Taiwan, South Korea, and Malaysia.
Since mainland China's economic reforms led by Deng Xiaoping land reforms have also played a key role in the development of the People's Republic of China, with the re-emergence of rich property developers in urban areas (though as in Hong Kong, land in China is not privately owned but leased from the state, typically on very long terms that allow substantial opportunity for private speculative gain).
[edit] Latin America
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"The first liberating revolutions never destroyed the large landholding powers that always constituted a reactionary force and upheld the principle of servitude on the land. In most countries the large landholders realized they couldn't survive alone and promptly entered into alliances with the monopolies — the strongest and most ruthless oppressors of the Latin American peoples. U.S. capital arrived on the scene to exploit the virgin lands and later carried off, unnoticed, all the funds so 'generously' given, plus several times the amount originally invested in the 'beneficiary' country."
- Brazil: In the 1930s, Getúlio Vargas reneged on a promised land reform. A first attempt to make a national scale reform was set up in the government of José Sarney, as a result of the strong popular movement that had contributed to the fall of the military government. However, the so-called First Land Reform National Plan never was put into force. Strong campaign including direct action by the Landless Workers' Movement throughout the 1990s has managed to get some advances for the past 10 years, during the Fernando Cardoso and Lula da Silva administrations.
- Bolivia: The revolution of 1952 was followed by a land reform law, but in 1970 only 45% of peasant families had received title to land, although more land reform projects continued in the 1970s and 1980s. Bolivian president Evo Morales restarted land reform when he took office in 2006.[5] On 29 November 2006, the Bolivian Senate passed a bill authorizing the government redistribution of land among the nation's mostly indigenous poor. The bill was signed into law hours later, though significant opposition is expected[6]
- Chile: Attempts at land reform began under the government of Jorge Alessandri in 1960, were accelerated during the government of Eduardo Frei Montalva (1964-1970), and reached its climax during the 1970-1973 presidency of Salvador Allende. Farms of more than 198 acres (80 hectares) were expropriated. After the 1973 coup the process was halted, and up to a point reversed by the market forces.
- Colombia: Alfonso López Pumarejo (1934-1938) passed the Law 200 of 1936, which allowed for the expropriation of private properties, in order to promote "social interest". Later attempts declined, until the National Front presidencies of Alberto Lleras Camargo (1958-1962) and Carlos Lleras Restrepo (1966-1970), which respectively created the Colombian Institute for Agrarian Reform (INCORA) and further developed land entitlement. In 1968 and 1969 alone, the INCORA issued more than 60,000 land titles to farmers and workers. Despite this, the process was then halted and the situation began to reverse itself, as the subsequent violent actions of drug lords, paramilitaries, guerrillas and opportunistic large landowners severely contributed to a renewed concentration of land and to the displacement of small landowners. In the early 21st century, tentative government plans to use the land legally expropriated from drug lords and/or the properties given back by demobilized paramilitary groups have not caused much practical improvement yet.
- Cuba: (See also main article Agrarian Reform Laws of Cuba) Land reform was among the chief planks of the revolutionary platform of 1959. Almost all large holdings were seized by the National Institute for Agrarian Reform (INRA), which dealt with all areas of agricultural policy. A ceiling of 166 acres (67 hectares) was established, and tenants were given ownership rights, though these rights are constrained by government production quotas and a prohibition of real estate transactions.
- El Salvador: One among several land reform efforts was made during the revolution/civil-war during the 1980s. Salvadoran President Jose Napoleon Duarte promoted land-reform as counter-strategy in the war, while the FMLN carried out their own land-reform in the territory under their control.
- Guatemala: land reform occurred during the "Ten Years of Spring", 1944–1954 under the governments of Juan José Arévalo and Jacobo Arbenz. It has been remarked that it was one of the most successful land reforms in history, given that it was relatively thorough and had minimal detrimental effects on the economy and on the incomes of wealthy classes (who were mostly spared because only uncultivated land was expropriated). The reforms were reversed entirely after a US-backed coup deposed the Arbenz government.[7]
- Mexico: The first land reform was driven by Ley Lerdo (the Lerdo Law of 1856), enacted by the liberals during the Reform War of the 1850s. One of the aims of the reform government was to develop the economy by returning to productive cultivation the underutilized lands of the Church and the municipal communities (Indian commons), which required the distribution of these lands to small owners. This was to be accomplished through the provisions of Ley Lerdo that prohibited ownership of land by the Church and the municipalities.[8] The reform government also financed its war effort by seizing and selling church property and other large estates. After the war the principles of the Ley Lerdo were perverted by Pres. Porfirio Diaz, which contributed to causing the Mexican Revolution in 1910. A certain degree of land reform was introduced, albeit unevenly, as part of the Mexican Revolution. Francisco Madero and Emiliano Zapata were strongly identified with land reform, as are the present-day (as of 2006) Zapatista Army of National Liberation. See Mexican Agrarian Land Reform.
- Nicaragua: Land reform was one of the programs of the Sandinista government. The last months of Sandinista rule were criticized for the Piñata Plan which distributed large tracts of land to prominent Sandinistas.
- Peru: land reform in the 1950s largely eliminated a centuries-old system of debt peonage. Further land reform occurred after the 1968 coup by left-wing colonel Juan Velasco Alvarado, and again as part of a counterterrorism effort against the Shining Path during the Internal conflict in Peru roughly 1988–1995, led by Hernando de Soto and the Institute for Liberty and Democracy during the early years of the government of Alberto Fujimori, before the latter's auto-coup.
- Venezuela: Hugo Chávez's government enacted Plan Zamora to redistribute government and unused private land to campesinos in need.
[edit] Middle East and North Africa
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Land reform is discussed in the article on Arab Socialism
- Egypt: Initially, Egyptian land reform essentially abolished the political influence of major land owners. However, land reform only resulted in the redistribution of about 15% of Egypt's land under cultivation, and by the early 1980s, the effects of land reform in Egypt drew to a halt as the population of Egypt moved away from agriculture. The Egyptian land reform laws were greatly curtailed under Anwar Sadat and eventually abolished.
- Syria: Land reforms were first implemented in Syria during 1958. The Agricultural Relations Law laid down a redistribution of rights in landownership, tenancy and management . A culmination of factors led to the halt of the reforms in 1961, these included opposition from large landowners and sever crop failure during a drought between 1958 and 1961, whilst Syria was a member of the doomed United Arab Republic (UAR). After the Ba'th Party gained power in 1963 the reforms were resumed.
The reforms were portrayed by the governing Ba'th Party as politically motivated to benefit the rural property-less communities. According to Arsuzi, a co-founder of the Ba'th Party, the reforms would, "liberate 75 percent of the Syrian population and prepare them to be citizens qualified to participate in the building of the state" [9]. It has been argued that the land reform represented work by the 'socialist government' however, by 1984 the private sector controlled 74 percent of Syria's arable land [10]. This questions both Ba'th claims of commitment to the redistribution of land to the majority of peasants as well as the state government being socialist - if it allowed the majority of land to be owned in the private sector how could it truly be socialist. Hinnebusch argued that the reforms were a way of galvanising support from the large rural population, "they[Ba'th Party members] used the implementation of agrarian reform to win over and organise peasants and curb traditional power in the countryside" [11]. To this extent the reforms succeeded with increase in Ba'th party membership, they also prevented political threat emerging from rural areas by bringing the rural population into the system as supporters.
- Iran: Significant land reform in Iran took place under the Shah as part of the socio-economic reforms of the White Revolution, begun in 1962, and agreed upon through a public referendum. At this time the Iranian economy was not performing well and there was political unrest. Essentially, the land reforms amounted to a huge redistribution of land to rural peasants who previously had no possibility of owning land as they were poorly paid labourers.
The land reforms continued from 1962 until 1971 with three distinct phases of land distribution: private, government-owned and endowed land. These reforms resulted in the newly-created peasant landowners owning six to seven million hectares, around 52-63% of Iran's agricultural land. According to Country-Data, even though there had been a considerable redistribution of land, the amount received by individual peasants was not enough to meet most families' basic needs, "About 75 percent of the peasant owners [however] had less than 7 hectares, an amount generally insufficient for anything but subsistence agriculture."[12].
By 1979 a quarter of prime land was in disputed ownership and half of the productive land was in the hands of 200,000 absentee landlords [12] The large land owners were able to retain the best land with the best access to fresh water and irrigation facilities. In contrast, not only were the new peasant land holdings too small to produce an income but the peasants also lacked both quality irrigation system and sustained government support to enable them to develop their land to make a reasonable living. Set against the economic boom from oil revenue it became apparent that the Land Reforms did not make life better for the rural population: according to Amid, "..only a small group of rural people experienced increasing improvements in their welfare and poverty remained the lot of the majority" [13].
Moghadam argues[citation needed] that the structural changes to Iran, including the land reforms, initiated by the White Revolution, contributed to the revolution in 1979 which overthrew the Shah and turned Iran into an Islamic republic.
- Iraq (1970)
[edit] Europe
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- Albania has gone through three waves of land reform since the end of World War II: in 1946 the land in estates and large farms was expropriated by the communist government and redistributed among small peasants; in the 1950s the land was reorganized into large-scale collective farms; and after 1991 the land was again redistributed among private smallholders. At the end of World War II, the farm structure in Albania was characterized by high concentration of land in large farms. In 1945, farms larger than 10 hectares, representing numerically a mere 3% of all farms in the country, managed 27% of agricultural land and just seven large estates (out of 155,000 farms) controlled 4% of agricultural land, averaging more than 2,000 hectares each (compared to the average farm size of 2.5 hectares at that time).[14] The first post-war constitution of independent Albania (March 1946) declared that land belonged to the tiller and that large estates under no circumstances could be owned by private individuals (article 10). The post-war land reform of 1946 redistributed 155,000 hectares (40% of the land stock) from 19,355 relatively large farms (typically larger than 5 hectares) to 70,211 small farms and landless households.[14] As a result, the share of large farms with more than 10 hectares declined from 27% of agricultural land in 1945 to 3% in 1954. By 1954, more than 90% of land was held in small and mid-sized farms of between 1 hectare and 10 hectares. The distributive effects of the post-war land reform were eliminated by the collectivization drive of the late 1950s-early 1960s, and by 1962 less than 18% of agricultural land had remained in family farms and household plots (the rest had shifted to Soviet-style collective and state farms).[14] By 1971 independent family farms had virtually disappeared and individual farming survived only in household plots cultivated part time by cooperative members (approximately 6% of agricultural land). The post-communist land reform begun in 1991 as part of the transition to the market was in effect a replay of the 1946 land reform, and the arable land held in cooperatives and state farms was equally distributed among all rural households without regard to pre-communist ownership rights. Contrary to other transition countries in Central and Eastern Europe, Albania adopted a distributive land reform (like the CIS) and did not restitute land to former owners. The post-communist land reform of the 1990s was accompanied by special land privatization legislation, as Albania was the only country outside the former Soviet Union that had nationalized all agricultural land (in stages between 1946 and 1976).[15]
- Bulgaria: Upon independence in 1878 the overwhelmingly Turkish nobles estates were redistributed among peasant smallholdings. Additional reforms were implemented in 1920-23 and a maximum ownership 30 hectares was fixed.
- Czechoslovakia: Major land reform was passed in 1919 redistributing mainly German noble's estates to peasant smallholdings. By 1937 60% of noble land was expropriated with remaining land mainly in unarable arias or German and Hungarian lands. Almost all remaining lands were redistributed in reforms of 1945 and 1948.
- Denmark: In 1849 a section in the constitution had forbidden the creation of new fiefs and promised the abolition of existing fiefs. However fiefholders dominated the government and it was not until 1919 that the necessary legislation could be passed. This legislation tranferred the fiefs to ordinary property that could be bought, sold and inherited like all other property. The state previously gained ownership to the fief if there was no male heirs and as compensation for the loss of this right the state demanded a one-time 25 % tax on the land and inventory of the fiefs. The value of the fiefs was assessed by the state itself. The tax rose each year the fiefholders waited to abolish their fiefs so the fiefs quickly disappeared. As part of the reform the state was entitled to take over one third of the land for a compensation that has since been criticised for being too small. This land was later handed over to smallholders. The tax levied on the estates as well as the division of land by ingheritance meant that the large estates as well as the estate holder class disappeared from Danish society and politics.
- Finland: In the general reparcelling out of land, begun in 1757, the medieval model of all fields consisting of numerous strips, each belonging to a farm, was replaced by a model of fields and forest areas each belonging to a single farm. In the further reparcellings which started to took place in 1848, the idea of concentrating all the land in a farm to a single piece of real estate was reinforced. In these reparcelling processes, the land is redistributed in direct proportion to earlier prescription. Both the general reparcelling and the further reparcelling processes are still active in some parts of the country. In 1918, Finland fought a civil war resulting in a series of land reforms. These included the compensated transfer of lease-holdings (torppa) to the leasers and prohibition of forestry companies to acquire land. After the Second World War, Karelians evacuated from areas ceded to Russia were given land in remaining Finnish areas, taken from public and private holdings. Also the veterans of war benefited from these allotments.
- France: a major and lasting land reform took place under the Directory during the latter phases of the French Revolution.
- Greece: At independence in 1835 the predominately Turkish nobles estates were redistributed as peasant smallholdings.
- Estonia and Latvia: at their founding as states in 1918–1919, they expropriate the large estates of Baltic German landowners, most of which was distributed among the peasants and became smallholdings.
- Hungary: In 1945 every estate bigger than 142 acres (57 ha) was expropriated without compensation and distributed among the peasants. In the 1950s collective ownership was introduced according to the Soviet model, but after 1990 co-ops were dissolved and the land was redistributed among private smallholders.
- Ireland: after the Irish Famine, land reform became the dominant issue in Ireland, where almost all of the land was owned by the Protestant Ascendancy. The Irish Parliamentary Party pressed for reform in a largely indifferent British House of Commons. Reform began tentatively in 1870 and continued for fifty years during which a number of Irish Land Acts were passed (see also Land War).
- Lithuania: the major land reform was initiated since the 1919 and was fully launched in 1922. The excess land was taken from the major landowners, mostly aristocracy, and redistributed among new landowners, primarily soldiers, or small landowners, 65,000 in total.
- Montenegro and Serbia: At independence in 1830 the predominately Turkish nobles estates were divided up among peasant smallholdings.
- Poland: there have been several land reforms in Poland. The most important include the land reforms in the Second Polish Republic (1919, 1921, 1923, 1925 and 1928) and in the People's Republic of Poland (1944).
- Romania: After failed attempts at land reform by Mihail Kogălniceanu in the years immediately after Romanian unification in 1863, a major land reform finally occurred in 1921, with a few additional reforms carried out in 1945.
- Slovenia and Croatia: With absorption into the kingdom of Yugoslavia land reform was passed in 1919 with subsidiary laws thereafter redistributing nobles estates among peasant smallholders. Additional reform was implemented in 1945 under the communist.
- Soviet Union
[edit] Africa
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- Ethiopia: The Derg carried out one of the most extensive land reforms in Africa in 1975.
- Kenya: Kenyatta launched a "willing buyer-willing seller" based land reform program in the 1960s, funded by Britain, the former colonial power. In 2006 president Mwai Kibaki said it will repossess all land owned by "absentee landlords" in the coastal strip and redistribute it to squatters.[16]
- Namibia: A limited land reform has been a hallmark of the regime of Sam Nujoma; legislation passed in September 1994, with a compulsory, compensated approach.[17]
- South Africa: "Land restitution" was one of the promises made by the African National Congress when it came to power in South Africa in 1994. Initially, land was bought from its owners (willing seller) by the government (willing buyer) and redistributed. However, as of early 2006, the ANC government announced that it will start expropriating the land, although according to the country's chief land-claims commissioner, Tozi Gwanya, unlike Zimbabwe there will be compensation to those whose land is expropriated, "but it must be a just amount, not inflated sums."[18][19]
- Zimbabwe: Efforts at land reform in Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe moved, after 15 years, in the 1990s, from a "willing seller, willing buyer" approach to the "fast track" land reform program. This was accelerated by "popular seizure" led by machete gangs of "war veterans" associated with the ruling party. Many parcels of land came under the control of people close to the government, as is the case throughout Africa. The several forms of forcible change in management caused a severe drop in production and other economic disruptions. In addition, the human rights violations and bad press led Britain, the European Union, the United States, and other Western allies to impose sanctions on the Zimbabwean government. All this has caused the collapse of the economy[citation needed]. The results have been disastrous and have resulted in widespread food shortages and large scale refugee flight.
[edit] North America
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- Canada: A land reform was carried out as part of Prince Edward Island's agreement to join the Canadian Confederation in 1873. Most of the land was owned by absentee landlords in England, and as part of the deal Canada was to buy all the land and give it to the farmers.
- United States:
- Following the American Civil War, the Radical Republicans attempted to put a land reform through Congress, promising "forty acres and a mule" to newly-freed blacks in the South, which was ultimately rejected by moderate elements as "socialistic." This failure left blacks without an economic base, and was one of the key contributing factors to the development of sharecropping and segregation.
- The Dawes Act of 1887 split the Indian tribal lands into allotments held by individual Indians. Most tribal land still owned by ethnic Indians was recollectivized in 1934.
[edit] Asia
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- China has been through a series of land reforms:
- In the 1940s, the Sino-American Joint Commission on Rural Reconstruction, funded with American money, with the support of the national government, carried out land reform and community action programs in several provinces.
- The thorough land reform launched by the Communist Party of China in 1946, three years before the foundation of the People's Republic of China (PRC), won the party millions of supporters among the poor and middle peasantry. The land and other property of landlords were expropriated and redistributed so that each household in a rural village would have a comparable holding. This agrarian revolution was made famous in the West by William Hinton's book Fanshen. By the time land reform was completed, at least a million landlords and members of their families had been publicly executed or beaten to death by enraged peasants.[20][21]
- In the mid-1950s, a second land reform during the Great Leap Forward compelled individual farmers to join collectives, which, in turn, were grouped into People's Communes with centrally controlled property rights and an egalitarian principle of distribution. This policy was generally a failure in terms of production. [2] The PRC reversed this policy in 1962 through the proclamation of the Sixty Articles. As a result, the ownership of the basic means of production was divided over three levels with collective land ownership vested in the production team (see also Ho [2001]).
- A third land reform beginning in the late 1970s re-introduced family-based contract system called the Household Responsibility System, which had enormous initial success, followed by a period of relative stagnation. Chen, Wang, and Davis [1998] suggest that the later stagnation was due, in part, to a system of periodic redistribution that encouraged over-exploitation rather than capital investment in future productivity. [3]. However, although land use rights were returned to individual farmers, collective land ownership was left undefined after the disbandment of the People's Communes.
- Since 1998 China is in the midst of drafting the new Property Law which is the first piece of national legislation that will define the land ownership structure in China for years to come. The Property Law forms the basis for China's future land policy of establishing a system of freehold, rather than of private ownership (see also Ho, [2005]).
- India: Due the taxation and regulation under the British Raj, at the time of independence, India inherited a semi-feudal agrarian system, with ownership of land concentrated with a few individual landlords (Zamindars, Zamindari System). Since independence, there has been voluntary and state initiated/mediated land reforms in several states. The most notable and successful example of land reforms are in the states of West Bengal and Kerala. After promising land reforms and elected to power in West Bengal in 1977, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)) kept their word and initiated gradual land reforms, such as Operation Barga. The result was a more equitable distribution of land among the landless farmers, and enumeration of landless farmers. This has ensured an almost life long loyalty from the farmers and the communists have been in power ever since. In Kerala, the only other large state where the CPI(M) came to power, state administrations have actually carried out the most extensive land, tenancy and agrarian labor wage reforms in the non-socialist late-industrializing world. [22] Another successful land reform program was launched in Jammu and Kashmir after 1947. However, this success was not replicated in other areas like the states of Andhra and Madhya Pradesh, where the more radical Communist Party of India (Maoist) or Naxalites resorted to violence as it failed to secure power. Even in West Bengal, the economy suffered for a long time as a result of the communist economic policies that did little to encourage heavy industries. In the state of Bihar, tensions between land owners militia, villagers and Maoists have resulted in numerous massacres. All in all, land reforms have been successful only in pockets of the country, as people have often found loopholes in the laws setting limits on the maximum area of land held by any one person.
- Japan: The first land reform, called the Land Tax Reform or chisokaisei (地租改正) was passed in 1873 as a part of the Meiji Restoration. Another land reform of Japan was carried out in 1947 (at the occupied era after World War II) by the instructions of GHQ by the proposal from the Japanese government. It was prepared before the defeat of the Greater Japanese Empire. It is also called Nōchi-kaihō (農地解放,emancipation of farming land ).
- Sri Lanka: In 1972, the Government of Sirimavo Bandaranaike, through the Land Reform Law, imposed a ceiling of twenty hectares on privately owned land and sought to distribute lands in excess of the ceiling for the benefit of landless peasants. Both land owned by public companies and paddy lands under ten hectares in extent were exempted from this ceiling. Between 1972 and 1974, the Land Reform Commission took over nearly 228,000 hectares. In 1975 the Land Reform (Amendment) Law brought over 169,000 hectares of plantations owned by companies (including British-owned companies) under state control.[23]
- Taiwan: In the 1950s, after the Nationalist government came to Taiwan, land reform and community development was carried out by the Sino-American Joint Commission on Rural Reconstruction. This course of action was made attractive, in part, by the fact that many of the large landowners were Japanese who had fled, and the other large landowners were compensated with Japanese commercial and industrial properties seized after Taiwan reverted from Japanese rule in 1945. The land program succeeded also because the Kuomintang were mostly from the mainland and had few ties to the remaining indigenous landowners.
- Vietnam: In the years after World War II, even before the formal division of Vietnam, land reform was initiated in North Vietnam. This land reform (1953-1956) redistributed land to more than 2 million poor peasants, but at a cost of from tens[24] to hundreds of thousands of lives[25] and was one of the main reason for the mass exodus of 1 million people from the North to the South in 1954. The probable democide for this four year period then totals 283,000 North Vietnamese.[26] South Vietnam made several further attempts in the post-Diem years, the most ambitious being the Land to the Tiller program instituted in 1970 by President Nguyen Van Thieu. This limited individuals to 15 hectares, compensated the owners of expropriated tracts, and extended legal title to peasants who in areas under control of the South Vietnamese government to whom had land had previously been distributed by the Viet Cong. Mark Moyar [1996] asserts that while it was effectively implemented only in some parts of the country, "In the Mekong Delta and the provinces around Saigon, the program worked extremely well... It reduced the percentage of total cropland cultivated by tenants from sixty percent to ten percent in three years." [4]
- South Korea: In 1945–1950, United States and South Korean authorities carried out a land reform that retained the institution of private property. They confiscated and redistributed all land held by the Japanese colonial government, Japanese companies, and individual Japanese colonists. The Korean government carried out a reform whereby Koreans with large landholdings were obliged to divest most of their land. A new class of independent, family proprietors was created. [5]
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- Philippines: During the Macapagal Administration in the early 1960s, a limited land reform program was initiated in Central Luzon covering rice fields. During the martial law era of the Marcos Administration, Presidential Decree 27 instituted a land reform program covering rice and corn farms. Rice and corn production under this land reform program was heavily supported by the Marcos Administration with land distribution and financing program known as the Masagana 99 and other production loans that led to increased rice and corn production. The country produced enough rice for local consumption and became a rice exporter during that period. The Aquino Administration in the mid 1980s instituted a very controversial land reform known as CARP which covered all agricultural lands. The program led to rice shortages in the succeeding years and lasted for 20 years without accomplishing the goal of land distribution. The program caused entrepreneurs to stay away from agriculture and a number of productive farmers left the farming sector. The CARP was a monumental failure in terms of cost to the government and the landowners whose lands were subjective legal landgrabbing by the government. CARP expired at the end of December 2008.[27]
[edit] Oceania
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- Australia: See Aboriginal Land Rights Acts.
- Fiji: In a reverse that proves the rule of land reform to benefit the native and indigenous people, the land in Fiji has always been owned by native Fijians, but much of it has been leased long-term to immigrant Indians. As these leases have reached their end-of-term native Fijians increasingly have refused to renew leases and have expelled the Indians.[citation needed]
[edit] See also
- Agrarian reform
- Anti-globalization movement
- Communism
- Eminent domain
- Homestead principle
- Georgism
- México Indígena
- Land rights
- Restitution
- Squatter
- Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus
- Land Banking
- Theft
Contrast:
[edit] References
- ^ Land Reform, Land Settlement and Cooperatives, FAO, Rome
- ^ Zimbabwe's "land reform" is considered by some to be not land reform at all, but merely the change in ownership from one elite (white farmers) to another (ZANU-PF commissars).
- ^ "Redistribution" as Euphemism or, Who Owns What? Philosophy Pathways, Number 65, 24 August 2003, by Anthony Flood
- ^ "Cuba: Historical Exception or Vanguard in the Anticolonial Struggle?" speech by Che Guevara on April 9, 1961
- ^ James Read, Bolivia head starts land handout, BBC News, 4 June 2006. Accessed 20 July 2006.
- ^ "Morales signs controversial bill into law." [1], Taipei Times, 30 November 2006. Accessed 30 November 2006.
- ^ Gleijeses, Piero. "The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz." Journal of Latin American Studies 21, 3 (1989): 453-480.
- ^ Jaime Suchlicki, Mexico: From Montezuma to the Fall of the PRI, Brassey's (2001), ISBN 1574883267, ISBN 9781574883268
- ^ as quoted in Heydemann 1999 p.193 'Authoritarianism in Syria: Institutions and Social Conflict' 1946-1970 Cornell University Press Ithica
- ^ Syria - Agriculture
- ^ Hinnebusch, R. 2001 p.55 'Syria Revolution From Above' Routledge New York
- ^ a b Iran - Rural Society
- ^ Amid, M. (1990) 'Agriculture, Poverty and Reform in Iran' London, Routledge
- ^ a b c Statistical Yearbook of the Popular Republic of Albania 1963, Department of Statistics, Tirana, 1964
- ^ Z. Lerman, C. Csaki, and G. Feder, Agriculture in Transition: Land Policies and Evolving Farm Structures in Post-Soviet Countries, Lexington Books, Lanham, MD, 2004.
- ^ Pledge to redistribute Kenya land
- ^ Namibia: Land Reform to Cost Billions
- ^ IRIN Africa | Southern Africa | South Africa | SOUTH AFRICA: Deadline for land transfer negotiations set | Governance | News Item
- ^ SA land expropriation to start soon : Mail & Guardian Online
- ^ Short, Philip (2001). Mao: A Life. Owl Books. pp. 436. ISBN 0805066381. http://books.google.com/books?id=HQwoTtJ43_AC&pg=PA436&dq=Mao+landlords+and+members+of+their+families+killed&ei=qHULSafGIJLsMvT9yKQE.
- ^ Stephen Rosskamm Shalom. Deaths in China Due to Communism. Center for Asian Studies Arizona State University, 1984. ISBN 0939252112 pg 24
- ^ [Heller, Patrick. 1999. The Labor of Development. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, Chapters 2 and 3.]
- ^ Sri Lanka land reform legislation
- ^ Communist Party of Vietnam, Kinh nghiệm giải quyết vấn đề ruộng đất trong cách mạng Việt Nam (Experience in land reform in the Vietnamese Revolution), available online: http://dangcongsan.vn/details.asp?topic=2&subtopic=5&leader_topic=79&id=BT1060374012
- ^ The Viet Minh Regime, Government and Administration in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Bernard Fall, Greenwood Press, Connecticut, 1975.
- ^ [http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP6.HTM Statistics Of Vietnamese Democide]
- ^ CARP not renewed, inquierer.net, 3 January 2009.
[edit] External links
- Land Research Action Network:News, Analysis, and Research on Land Reform
- Land Reform in Scotland
- Fast Track Land Reform in Zimbabwe
- The Land Reform of 1919–1940: Lithuania and the Countries of East and Central Europe
- FAO Multilingual Thesaurus on Land Tenure
- FAO International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD), March 2006
- Civil Society conference "Land, Territory and Dignity", March 2006
- William Rees-Mogg, South Africa's bitter harvest, The Times, 11 September 2006
- World Bank archived online discussion: "Can Formal Property Titling Programs Ensure Increased Business Investments and Growth?"
- The Distribution of Bolivia's Most Important Natural Resources and the Autonomy Conflicts Center for Economic and Policy Research
[edit] References
- P.P.S. Ho, Who Owns China's Land? Policies, Property Rights and Deliberate Institutional Ambiguity, The China Quarterly, Vol. 166, June 2001, pp. 387–414
- R. H. Tawney, Land and Labour in China New York, Harcourt Brace & Company (1932).
- Fu Chen, Liming Wang and John Davis, "Land reform in rural China since the mid-1980s", Land Reform 1998/2, a publication of the Sustainable Development Department of the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
- William H. Hinton. Fanshen: A documentary of revolution in a Chinese village. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1966. ISBN 0-520-21040-9.
- P.P.S. Ho, Institutions in Transition: Land Ownership, Property Rights and Social Conflict in China, (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2005)
- Mark Moyar, "Villager attitudes during the final decade of the Vietnam War". Presented at 1996 Vietnam Symposium "After the Cold War: Reassessing Vietnam".
- Summary of "Efficiency and wellbeing for 80 years" by Tarmo Luoma on site of TEHO magazine.
CPM, Trinamool in soup as land scam rocks Bengal
After pressure mounting from Alimuddin Street for arresting all those involved in the shady land deal, the chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee [ Images ] held a meeting with the chief secretary and the DG of police and reviewed the situation. Later the chief secretary said that police investigation would cover the entire gamut of things and no one involved would be spared.
On August 23, an armed mob entered Vedic Village, a resort built on 44 acres of land near Rajarhat New Town, and set it on fire and destroying almost 70 per cent of it. They were mostly local villagers who were provoked into doing this after Gaffar Mollah, a land mafia, attacked and disrupted a local football tournament with bombs and gun fire and then took shelter in the resort.
One person was killed and few others were seriously injured. The villagers attacked the resort as over the years Gaffar has been identified with the resort as its henchman to grab more land in the neighbourhood.
Gaffar is absconding but police have arrested one official of the resort as the crucial link with Gaffar and one of Gaffar's associates has also been nabbed by police. Police have discovered a good number of firearms and other weapons from the resort.
Debesh Das, the minister in charge of Department of Information Technology, has said that his department had entered into an agreement last year with Akash Nirman Private Limited, a consortium of number of businessmen, of which Vedic Village Resorts Company was a major stakeholder. According to the agreement the said company will procure land to the tune of 1,200 acres in area adjacent to Rajarhat New Town, and of that procured land will hand over 600 acres to his department free of cost.
In return, the IT department will bear the cost of developing and provide infrastructure. Debesh Das said, "Already, they have identified 500 acres of which around 200 acres have been offered to the state government. But we are examining the documents related to the ownership and so on. We are yet to take possession of the land."
He further added that 'the entire deal was cleared by the state Cabinet.'
Yet a number of ministers were apparently not in the know of this. Khsiti Goswami, the PWD minister and leader of RSP, said that he did not think that the deal was ever discussed in the Cabinet. He remembered that the chief minister once informed the Cabinet that there had been a surge of demand for land in the IT sector in Salt Lake-Rajarhat New Town area.
But since there was no land available in that area, the government has decided to look for land in the adjacent areas to accommodate IT giants like Infosys [ Get Quote ] and Wipro [ Get Quote ].
The IT minister claimed that since the company engaged by the government was in a process of making outright purchase of land, the government would be spared from acquiring land invoking the Land Acquisition Act, 1894. He did not see any problem with the urban or rural land ceiling Act, as the nature of the land use (from farm land to industry or commercial land) would be changed in the process.
Gautam Deb, minister in charge of department of housing, expressed surprise over this issue and said that the government must find out about the deal between the Vedic Village and the IT sector.
Deb admitted that the government and the ruling CPI-M [ Images ] were worried and concerned. He demanded to know who in the government were responsible for granting land to Vedic Village over and above the land ceiling Act. Deb indicated that the government would come out with a statement in this regard.
Already the names of one minister of the Left Front government (Rezzak Mollah) and the TMC MLA of the area have come up in relation to the land deals related to the resort. Raj Kishore Modi, the chairman of the Vedic Village Resorts, has been denying any link with the land mafias but was later arrested. Police have claimed that they have got evidence of close link between the resort officials and Gaffar.
Already the villagers are vocal about the role of the local TMC MLA and some of the CPI-M leaders.
Now, with pressure mounted by the chief minister after a meeting, police are likely to unearth some more valuable information which might jar the political parties and the government. Knowing that their MLA is also involved in the scandal, the TMC and their leader Mamata Banerjee [ Images ] have so far been a bit less vocal in attacking the ruling party and the government.
However, Mamata Banerjee said her party would gherao the local police station to highlight the issue. On the other hand, Biman Bose, the state secretary of CPI-M, and Shyamal Chakrabarty, a member of CPI(M) central committee have been demanding stern action against those involved in the deal. Singur was instance of highhanded attitude of the state government in procuring land.
But in the last 30 years, forcible procurement of land had been a major occupation of the realtors-developers, where the political parties of all hues lent their support in exchange of other considerations. Vedic Village scam is threatening to explode in the face of the political parties now.
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