BJP today refuted the charge that the Land Acquisition Bill brought by the Narendra Modi government was “anti-farmer” and claimed that “long-term interests” of the agriculturists had been kept in mind while preparing the draft.
The party also defended the decision to go for the ordinance route pointing out that notification of the proposed Act by a certain date was a “Constitutional obligation”.
“Opposition parties like Congress, Trinamool, Samajwadi Party and BSP have been carrying out a relentless campaign to create an impression that the ordinance is anti-farmer. We want to make it clear that contrary to their claims, the provisions in the ordinance will provide huge long-term benefits to the farmers of the country,” BJP national secretary Siddharth Nath Singh told reporters here.
He said one of the points on which the ordinance has been called anti-farmer was doing away with the clause which entitled the farmers to get their land back in the event of the project for which it was acquired not getting completed within five years.
“This was necessary as washing hands off projects by returning the land to farmers was earning us a world-wide dubious reputation of India becoming a country of unfinished projects”, Singh said.
Citing an example of unfinished production unit of Nano car project of Tata Motors, he said, the biggest example of ill-effects of projects remaining unfinished is the site at Singur (in West Bengal) where Tatas wanted to set up a production unit for Nano cars.
“The farmers whose land was acquired are today left with no cultivable tracts nor do they have access to employment opportunities which might have come their way had the project seen the light of the day,” Singh, who is BJP’s in-charge for West Bengal, said. Further, Singh said, another provision which the Opposition was criticising was covering affordable housing projects under the ambit of the proposed Act.
“This was, however, necessary in view of the Modi government’s pledge to ensure that all people of the country had their own homes by 2022. How could this be possible if land was available only at high rates prevailing in the market,” BJP leader added.
Singh also slammed opposition parties for making hue and cry over making availability of land easier for industrial corridors.
“We want to ask the opposition parties, will the farmers not benefit from a compensation that has to be four times the prevailing price of land? And will such corridors not result in escalation of land prices in the vicinity, thereby profiting even those farmers who owned tracts nearby,” he questioned.
“All these points make it amply clear that the Bill is pro-farmer and that the allegations made by the opposition are baseless.”
Clarifying why Modi government has taken the ordinance route, Singh said, “Lastly, we would like to speak about the excessive noise surrounding the government taking the ordinance route. We hope that the opposition parties are aware that notifying such proposed laws by a certain date is a Constitutional obligation.”