The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government’s proposed land acquisition law, a politically sensitive and critical piece of legislation that could potentially remove a big roadblock to industrial investment, aims to address rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R), providing safeguards for both land owners and livelihood losers, while clearly defining the “public purpose” for which land can be acquired by the government. “This draft Bill seeks to balance the need for facilitating land acquisition...

The Centre today unveiled a draft land acquisition bill that seeks to replace a 117-year-old law, prohibits the acquisition of multi-crop irrigated land and includes in the definition of “public purpose” plots for companies. The government posted the draft National Land Acquisition and Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill, 2011, on four websites, seeking comments from the public and all stakeholders. (See chart) The draft makes it clear that the government is not amending...

On the night of June 21,  around 10 p.m., the police of West Bengal’s Hooghly district descended on Tata Motors’ half-built Singur plant and threw out the private guards there. In about half an hour, the new government in West Bengal, under the leadership of Mamata Banerjee, took over the 997 acres that had proved to be the Waterloo of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) and its allies.   Earlier,...

Kolkata : Tata Motors Limited today told the Calcutta High Court that after the relocation of the Nano plant, the company had been interested in using the land for alternative investment and, therefore, could not be accused of abandoning the area. The automobile manufacturer — which has challenged the Singur Land Development and Rehabilitation Act, 2011 — also discussed the issue with the then Left Front government, Tata Motors counsel Samaraditya...

-The Business Standard   Political rhetoric dominated the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) annual executive committee meet today, even as two key faces of Mamata Banerjee’s administration reiterated the government’s stance of not acquiring land for industry. “Under no circumstances will the government acquire land for the industry,” Partha Chatterjee, West Bengal’s commerce and industries minister told the industry body. Also present at the event was state’s finance...