-The Hindu The Bill to amend the 2013 land acquisition Act is neither pro-farmer nor pro-poor Next week the economic agenda of the Narendra Modi government will face its biggest test in Parliament. The controversial Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015 (LARR) that has been introduced in Lok Sabha is due for consideration of the house on March 9. While the government seems...

-The Hindu The proposed amendment bill to the Land Act has amendments that are an exercise of state power without reason, with the basis for these changes on assertions of a vague agenda of development. What is equally disturbing is that at least some of the changes that these amendments propose, if passed, would also be patently unconstitutional In his celebrated treatise on constitutional law, H.M. Seervai began a discussion on the...

-Livemint.com The transition cannot take place if India's farming-dependant population is given the choice to remain in rural hinterlands and practice agriculture Until January 2014, when the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (RFCTLA) came into force, Indian farmers were at the mercy of the colonial era Land Acquisition Act, 1894. Under the older law, the state could forcibly acquire private land under a...

-The Hindu Interview with social activist Medha Patkar on why she opposes the Land Bill proposed by the Centre Social activist Medha Patkar has been in the forefront of the struggle for the rights and rehabilitation of project-displaced populations for over two decades, and has relentlessly pursued the formulation of a national rehabilitation policy. She spoke to Gargi Parsai at the site of the agitation in Delhi about the pitfalls in the...

-PTI New Delhi: Under fire from the Opposition on the Land ordinance, government today said it is considering a number of representations from stakeholders expressing concerns on the interests of the farmers on the provisions of the law. Defending the ordinance to amend the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Resettlement and Rehabilitation Act, 2013, Law Minister D V Sadananda Gowda told Lok Sabha that many state governments and...