Farmers' interests vis-a-vis corporates' fully protected: Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday assured farmers that their interests in relation to private industry will remain fully protected even through the changes proposed in the land acquisition act.

"I want to tell you loud and clear that all the rules applicable to private industry and enterprise in the land acquisition law of 2013 will continue to apply," Modi said in his 'Mann Ki Baat' radio address to farmers.

"The industrial corridors (on acquired land) are not private, it is the government which will make them," he added.

The government has proposed amending the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, to expand sectors where assessment and mandatory 80 percent consent of landowners will not be required.

The five sectors where the mandatory consent clause and the Social Impact Assessment (SIA) will not be applicable are when land is acquired for national security, defence, rural infrastructure, industrial corridors and housing for the poor including public-private partnership (PPP) where ownership of land continues to be vested with the government.

However, in a pro-farmer move, the present government is proposing that resettlement and compensation provisions be made applicable for 13 existing pieces of legislation under which there is no uniform central policy of rehabilitation and resettlement.

These acts are the Coal Bearing Areas Acquisition and Development Act, 1957; the National Highways Act, 1956; Land Acquisition (Mines) Act, 1885; Atomic Energy Act, 1962; the Indian Tramways Act, 1886; the Railways Act, 1989; the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958; the Petroleum and Minerals Pipelines (Acquisition of Right of User in Land) Act, 1962; the Damodar Valley Corporation Act, 1948; the Electricity Act, 2003; the Requisitioning and Acquisition of Immovable Property Act, 1952; the Resettlement of Displaced Persons (Land Acquisition) Act, 1948; and the Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978.