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In fields now bearing wheat, cotton and cumin, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi promises to build a city rivaling the most advanced in the world. Farmer Ganpatbhai Chauhan doesn’t believe a word of it.
“They say this will become like Singapore, our land will turn into gold,” said Chauhan, 45, sitting on a rope cot on the veranda of his house in the village of Sarasla, showing the notices he has received to vacate about a third of his 22 acres. “It’s all lies. Losing my land will ruin me.”
The cluster of mud houses with clay-tiled roofs is one of 22 villages in the flat alluvial wheat basket of Modi’s home state of Gujarat that is earmarked for Dholera, a city designed to be larger than Berlin when completed in about three decades. The government sees 100 such urban centers transforming the fortunes and image of the nation, which accounts for almost one of every five people in the world. Farmers see an attempt to seize their land cheaply.
It’s a standoff that has hampered India’s development for decades. Since January, it’s become even worse. That’s when the previous government passed an act requiring consent from at least 70 percent of owners before the government or companies can buy land for infrastructure projects. Since then, not one large tract of land has been acquired for development.
“It’s an impasse,” said Rajya Vardhan Kanoria, chairman of the Task Force on Land Reforms and Policy at the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in New Delhi. “All land acquisitions are suspended. It’s not helping anybody -- neither industry nor the farmers.”
The standoff is exacerbated by buyers’ unwillingness to pay higher prices after years of being able to seize land cheaply, said Niranjan Sahoo, an analyst at New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, an independent think tank.
“The mindset of companies and authorities hasn’t changed,” he said. “They still want to take away land at a very cheap rate.”
Gaining Strength
“The act has given us strength to fight,” said Vighji Singh Patel, a farmer in Shela village who may lose half of his 40 acres to the Dholera project. “If they’re determined to buy it, let them acquire our land under the new law.”
Modi’s government is trying to amend the land act in line with his Gujarat laws. That won’t be easy because his Bharatiya Janata Party doesn’t have enough seats in the upper house of parliament and some parties will reject the proposal as too anti-farmer, said Sahoo at Observer Research.
Meanwhile his Dholera dream remains stalled. The Gujarat High Court has issued notices to the state and federal government asking them to respond to the villagers’ petition. “We’d like to sell our land on our own terms,” said Patel, the farmer in Shela village. “If you want to buy it, come to us and negotiate the price directly.”
Modi Dream Stuck in the Mud as Land Law Empowers Farmers - Bloomberg
“They say this will become like Singapore, our land will turn into gold,” said Chauhan, 45, sitting on a rope cot on the veranda of his house in the village of Sarasla, showing the notices he has received to vacate about a third of his 22 acres. “It’s all lies. Losing my land will ruin me.”
The cluster of mud houses with clay-tiled roofs is one of 22 villages in the flat alluvial wheat basket of Modi’s home state of Gujarat that is earmarked for Dholera, a city designed to be larger than Berlin when completed in about three decades. The government sees 100 such urban centers transforming the fortunes and image of the nation, which accounts for almost one of every five people in the world. Farmers see an attempt to seize their land cheaply.
It’s a standoff that has hampered India’s development for decades. Since January, it’s become even worse. That’s when the previous government passed an act requiring consent from at least 70 percent of owners before the government or companies can buy land for infrastructure projects. Since then, not one large tract of land has been acquired for development.
“It’s an impasse,” said Rajya Vardhan Kanoria, chairman of the Task Force on Land Reforms and Policy at the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in New Delhi. “All land acquisitions are suspended. It’s not helping anybody -- neither industry nor the farmers.”
The standoff is exacerbated by buyers’ unwillingness to pay higher prices after years of being able to seize land cheaply, said Niranjan Sahoo, an analyst at New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, an independent think tank.
“The mindset of companies and authorities hasn’t changed,” he said. “They still want to take away land at a very cheap rate.”
Gaining Strength
“The act has given us strength to fight,” said Vighji Singh Patel, a farmer in Shela village who may lose half of his 40 acres to the Dholera project. “If they’re determined to buy it, let them acquire our land under the new law.”
Modi’s government is trying to amend the land act in line with his Gujarat laws. That won’t be easy because his Bharatiya Janata Party doesn’t have enough seats in the upper house of parliament and some parties will reject the proposal as too anti-farmer, said Sahoo at Observer Research.
Meanwhile his Dholera dream remains stalled. The Gujarat High Court has issued notices to the state and federal government asking them to respond to the villagers’ petition. “We’d like to sell our land on our own terms,” said Patel, the farmer in Shela village. “If you want to buy it, come to us and negotiate the price directly.”
Modi Dream Stuck in the Mud as Land Law Empowers Farmers - Bloomberg
