Cong stages walkout against land acquisition amendment
The Bill proposes to exempt development projects, rural infra, affordable housing, industrial corridors, etc from ambit of social impact assessment study
CHANDIGARH: The opposition Congress MLAs on Tuesday staged a walkout from the House to register their protest against the passage of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Haryana Amendment) Bill in the assembly.
The amendment Bill proposes to exempt certain development projects, rural infrastructure, affordable housing, industrial corridors, health, education and urban metro rail projects from the ambit of social impact assessment study and provision to safeguard food security.
Congress MLAs led by leader of the opposition, Bhupinder Singh Hooda demanded that the Bill should be held back and referred to a select committee of
the House for scrutiny.
Congress MLA from Tosham, Kiran Choudhry said the amendment Bill was anti-farmer and anti-poor. “The principal Act of 2013 is a benevolent legislation which takes care of the interests of landowners and farmers. However, this amendment Bill proposes to do away with the requirement of taking the prior consent of at least 70% of the land losing families for acquisition of land for public private partnership (PPP) projects,” said
Choudhry.
Congress MLA Bharat Bhushan Batra said the proposed amendments were outside the stated objects and reasons of the principal Act. “The intent of this law was to have a consultative process for land acquisition and to determine the public purpose. These aspects were being done away with. This amendment Bill should be referred to a select committee of the House,” said Batra.
Leader of opposition, Bhupinder
Singh Hooda said the Bill reeked of crony capitalism. It aims to give vast powers to the government in matters of land acquisition and puts the stakeholders at complete disadvantage, said Hooda. First-time Congress MLA from Dabwali, Amit Sihag said that since the Central government had also tried to amend the principal Act on similar lines without success, there is a need to have discussion on the proposed amendment.
Seeking an addition in the amendment Bill, BJP MLA from Nangal Chaudhary, Abhe Singh Yadav said in Section 10 A (c) of the amendment Bill, which empowered the government to exempt certain projects pertaining to affordable housing, housing for poor people and for rehabilitation of persons displaced due to either acquisition of land by the state government or by any natural calamity, it is proposed that projects for rehabilitation of persons evicted from lands under any forest or archaeological site notified for the protection or preservation under any law in force for the time being, should also be exempted. Yadav’s proposed modification was carried out by revenue minister Dushyant Chautala.
Supporting the amendment Bill, JJP MLA from Narnaund, Ram Kumar Gautam said since no land could be acquired for public purpose under the existing law, it was important to amend the principal Act.
Defending the amendment Bill, the revenue minister said many state governments such as Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat have carried out similar amendments in the principal Act. The amendment Bill was passed by the assembly and will have to be reserved for the consideration of the President for his assent.