Bengal govt not to acquire land for industry: Panel

The two-member expert committee constituted by the West Bengal government to draft a new land policy in the state, has recommended direct purchase of land by industrialists from farmers.

“We have asked the state government not to acquire land for setting up industry,” said Debabrata Bandopadhaya, a member of the expert committee, after giving the report to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

The committee has also made several recommendations to protect the interests of small and marginal farmers. According to reports, the panel has provided guidelines to the state government to create a land map.

If the government accepts the recommendations, it may hinder several projects in the pipeline, including the Rs 9,600-crore NTPC project for a 1,600-Mw unit in Katwa. The public sector undertaking needs 1,035 acres but the government had made it clear that it would not acquire land for the project. Last year, the company had acquired 387 acres.

The recommendations have come a day after passage of the ‘Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Bill’ to revoke the lease agreement with Tata Motors for the 997 acres at Singur, to return 400 acres to unwilling farmers.

Banerjee’s anti-land acquisition movements in Singur and Nandigram had changed the course of politics in the state and helped her party, Trinamool Congress, to wrest power, ending 34 years of Left Front rule. Soon after coming to power, Banerjee had set up the expert committee on May 30.

The committee comprised renowned lawyer Soumendranath Bose and Bandopadhaya, an architect of ‘Operation Barga’ that had facilitated distribution of millions of acres among landless farmers and tillers from 1978.