RLD demands new Land Acquisition Act

Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) president Ajit Singh today demanded a new Act for land acquisition to replace the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 to protect the rights of land owners.

The party will soon table a proposal in Parliament for framing fresh land acquisition laws.

Addressing a news conference here, Singh said the current Act had failed to fetch remunerative prices to land owners and led to rampant acquisition of fertile land.

“In Uttar Pradesh, huge tracks of fertile land have been acquired for Ganga Expressway and Yamuna Expressway. For Yamuna Expressway, almost 2,000 villages and in some cases, entire tehsils in western UP districts have been acquired,” he added.

Singh alleged that land acquisition had become a source of easy money for the state government.

“The Mayawati government has done most of the land acquisition by invoking emergency provisions of the current Act, which denies the right of raising objections by the farmers,” he claimed.

The RLD chief noted the compensation paid to land owners should also contain the component of potential cost of their land, when being acquired for commercial use.

“Our party is talking to other parties on the issue and we will moot a proposal in the current session of Parliament for enacting new laws on land acquisition,” he informed.

The former union agriculture minister flayed the Centre for failing to curb inflation and maintained fuel price hike would further aggravate the situation.

“Futures trading in food commodities is responsible for food inflation as speculators jack up the price without any actual delivery taking place,” he warned.

Singh added that incumbent agriculture minister Sharad Pawar by saying that prices would further rise had only given lead to hoarders and black marketers.