-The Business Standard   Among the many initiatives and innovations being considered to improve returns to farming, the creation of producers’ companies deserves closer policy attention than has been the case so far. A farmers’ company, registered as a corporate entity with the registrar of companies, under the Companies Act, can help farm producers come together and derive economies of scope and scale. A group of farmers in Andhra Pradesh has reportedly...

-The Hindu   The longstanding demand to correct anomalies in the Land Acquisition Act (1894) and check its misuse, and the impending Uttar Pradesh Assembly election have compelled the United Progressive Alliance government to come up with a much-improved piece of legislation. In speedily reshaping the proposed Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill, which has been placed in the public domain as part of a pre-legislative consultative process, Jairam Ramesh, the new...

-The Telegraph   The upcoming Uttar Pradesh elections and its importance for Rahul Gandhi have prompted the Centre to try and speed up the Land Acquisition bill’s introduction and passage. The government is keen to introduce the bill in the current session of Parliament, which ends on September 8, though rural development minister Jairam Ramesh had earlier indicated that the consultation process would take some time. The bill will go to the standing...

Tribal affairs minister K.C. Deo feels the draft Land Acquisition bill does not adequately protect the Scheduled Tribes’ rights in case they have to be displaced to a non-scheduled area. Deo told The Telegraph he would write to rural development minister Jairam Ramesh about this. “Tribal people enjoy constitutional protection in the scheduled areas. If they are displaced for a certain project and resettled outside the scheduled area, the question is whether...

-The Hindustan Times   The government on Wednesday defended the allotment of land to the Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust in Haryana, saying it was done with the "full consent" of the village panchayat. "The land allotment had the full consent of the panchayat which had unanimously passed a resolution for leasing it for 33 years," I&B Minister Ambika Soni told reporters outside Parliament House. The land allotment to the trust in Gurgaon's...