The Land Ordinance brought in
last year by the Modi government, to amend the LARR Act, 2013 was criticized widely. In fact the said Ordinance was not needed at all, but was brought in supposedly to send right signals to the investors and the corporate world.
The 2013 act was passed after struggle of two decades and a very
long deliberation, after having gone through two parliamentary Standing Committees,
both of them headed by the BJP MPs (Kalyan Singh and Sumitra
Mahajan receptively). The Act was supported by all the
political parties including BJP in the Parliament. Still without even
trying to implement and see how it works, the newly elected BJP government
declared it anti industry and and anti growth and brought an
Ordinance to amend the Act and get rid of all the pro farmers
provisions of the act, tilting it heavily in favor of the corporate and the
development agencies.
But as the media reports are
suggesting the government and the ruling party seem to be now worried about
their anti-farmers tag. The Delhi state election results, where the loss in the
outer rural Delhi constituencies are being linked to the Land Ordinance,
have also forced the BJP to think about the electoral outcomes of the policies
being pushed by the Modi government.
The opposition parties have
opposed the Ordinance and are likely to take a tough stand, especially in the
Rajya Sbha, where unlike the Loksabha, BJP does not enjoy a majority.
Additionally a farmers'
campaign led by Ekta Parishad (a people's organisation focusing land rights)
and supported by many known activists started a march last week which is
reaching Delhi tomorrow. National Alliance of Peoples Movement (NAPM),
another outfit which is an alliance of various anti-displacement and other
people's organisations is also opposing the Land Ordinance
since beginning and has joined the thousands of marching
farmers.
But what is bringing lots of
media attention to this movement is support and presence of noted
anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare, who has also criticized the Land
Ordinance 2014 as 'anti farmers'.
Rashtriya Syamsevak Sangh
(RSS), BJP's mother organisation, has also linked the BJPs routing in Delhi
elections with the Land Ordinance,besides other factors. Not only this, Bhartiya Kisan Union, the farmers body of RSS Parivar, has also attacked the BJP government for
the Ordinance and has threatened to hit the streets if the Ordinance is
not withdrawn. BKS has also not ruled out joining the protesting
farmers led by Hazare and other activists.
So how the Modi government
plans to tackle the stiff opposition its facing outside
and inside parliament over the Ordinance? is an important question.
It seems the BJP government
wants just two things at the moment: Getting rid of its anti-farmers image, the
Ordinance has created and get the Ordinance bill passed in
the Parliament by the political maneuvering and the floor
management in the houses of the Parliament. As The Economic Times reports
here, the government is not in mood to make changes in
the Ordinance.
The recent assertion of the
Prime Minister Modi on his governments believe in a
secular and tolerant society and his presence at the mega
show of 'tilakotsav' of the two Yadav political families have been seen
by some analysts as efforts to humor the Opposition before the
crucial budget session of the Parliament.
The political parties in the
opposition are hardly serious in saving the LARR Act 2013. We must remember
that most of the state governments, including Congress ruled governments, had reportedly favoured various radical changes in the LARR Act 2013 in a meeting of Revenue Ministers of all the states called by the Ministry
of Rural Development. The Congress party, whose government had brought the 2013
Act, has also not resisted the Ordinance very strongly. Rahul Gandhi,
the Vice President and young face of the party, is
as usual missing in action again.
The friendly organisations of
BJP like the BKS are careful not to support the LARR 2013 in toto. BKS
general secretary Prabhakar Kelkar told The Indian Express “The land
acquisition Act passed by the UPA government was no doubt extreme because it
made any land acquisition practically impossible. But the present government
has gone to the other extreme by doing away with the 80 per cent landowners’
consent clause and social impact assessment even for land being acquired for
private industry,”
Obviously the BKS is
trying to find a middle ground for the government, where the compromise could
be made and the government could retain most of the anti-people provisions of
the Ordinance and the BJP and the Parivar could also maintain their pro-farmers
image. The land rights activists leading the farmers’ anti-Ordinance
campaign must be aware, or should I say wary (!), of the presence of RSS
ideologue Govindacharya in the march.
First published on the News Buzz India
First published on the News Buzz India
