Locational Politics of Land

This chapter focuses on the locational aspect of the new wave of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in post-liberalization India. It argues that unlike the earlier Nehruvian era steel towns which aimed at locating new towns in economically backward regions of the country, the promoters of the new SEZs, and more broadly post-liberalization urban enclaved developments, are attracted to former agrarian regions that benefited from prior pre-liberalization investment. These regions have prior market linkages that are desirable to the new private capital; the agricultural land in these regions is also owned by organized agrarian constituencies belonging to regional dominant castes. As policymakers, search for new decentralized and market-oriented means for the transfer of land from agrarian constituencies to urban promoters and developers, the re-allocation of property control is erupting into volatile land-based social conflicts. By focusing on the case of the Khed SEZ in the Pune district in western Maharashtra, this chapter traces a form of ‘antagonistic cooperation’ where historically adversarial groups—firms and agrarian landowners, agrarian propertied classes and Adivasi labourers—come together briefly for a new experiment in land assembly for an SEZ. As productive agricultural land is transformed into new urban enclaves, the Khed Adivasis experience Janus-faced social change, where the locational politics of the new SEZ both generates a new politics of recognition but also exposes them to the new uncertainties of a market economy.

Debating Land

Land is one of those rare issues that has animated Indian Parliament and been intensely debated from the 1950s to contemporary times. One of the key elements of the very first amendment to the Indian Constitution, passed by the provisional parliament in 1951, was related to land reform and the abolition of zamindari or large land holdings. In response to court rulings that declared zamindari abolition laws as unconstitutional, Jawaharlal Nehru and the Congress reacted by inserting Article 31A in the Constitution which stipulated that nothing in the Fundamental Rights could be used to strike down laws for the appropriation of property. The most important component of the First Amendment was, however, Article 31B, which created the Ninth Schedule where legislation could be put and made immune from judicial review. Thirteen land reform Acts were placed in the schedule. This chapter analyses the parliamentary debates on land, beginning with the First Amendment and continuing to the contemporary period where the BJP government attempted to amend the 2013 Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act. The chapter examines three broad questions. How has the issue of land, land reform, and land acquisition been framed over time in parliament? How much have contemporary politics influenced the debate? What have been the recurrent themes as well as radical departures in the debates on land?

The Effect of Urban Land-Use Regulations on Density

Urban land is crucial to economic productivity and growth in cities, given substantial land intensive economic activity takes place. While land use regulations are needed for inclusive growth and to protect the urban poor, they create distortions in the land market, and become counter-productive. Indian cities are characterized by strong urban land use controls, given its socialistic and planned economy for a long time. Draconian land use regulations that continue to exist in India’s cities are rent control and highly restrictive floor area ratios (FARs). In this chapter, I focus on FARs and rent control to a limited extent. I examine the impact FARs have on population and household density, in the context of the standard urban framework, taking the case of Bengaluru, where ward-level data have been recently put together on FARs. I find in Bengaluru that FARs impact (both population and household) density negatively, consistent with what other studies have found. The Karnataka rent control Act essentially renders the Act ineffective in Bengaluru. In the context of Mumbai, I use anecdotal evidence to examine FAR, where the effects are compounded by the existence of other distortions such as rent control. Based on the findings, the chapter summarizes the policy implications, its caveats, concludes and presents directions for future research.

Land Making and Industry Making in Tamil Nadu

This chapter addresses a central research question of how socio-political factors explain a high level of land acquisition in the state of Tamil Nadu in India that is coupled with intensive industrialization. It answers the question by paying attention to the ideas of policymakers on inclusive industrial schemes and societal structure presenting the upward mobility of low-caste groups in both political and economic spheres in the state. It argues that the state’s commitment to land making and industry making has met the needs of citizens favouring urbanization, thereby contributed to industrial development. Fieldwork findings collated from a bargaining process between the state, society, and foreign capital for land acquisition at a special economic zone for a tyre-manufacturing foreign company strongly support the argument. It particularly stresses the significant role of bureaucratic elites who are proficient at dealing with land acquisition with knowledge and efficiency. The bureaucratic efficiency increases the capacity of the state in making industrial development transferrable.

Land Acquisition in India

This chapter examines the contentious issue of land acquisition in India, focusing on the deeply regressive system in operation from independence to the mid-2000s that caused wipeouts for millions of families, the flash of resistance to acquisitions starting around 2006–7, the creation of a new law in 2013 to enhance justice and rights, and an attempt in 2014–15 to amend that new law. The central questions that arise from this process are: why did a regressive system last so long? and, why did it die in the last decade? These are best answered in a political-economy framework in which increasing political competition has challenged the electoral mathematics of ‘majoritarianism’ and increased the viability of ‘wedge issue’ politics.

The Dilemma of Balancing Growth and Social Justice

At Independence in 1947, India emerged from a century and half of economic stagnation, a radicalized and land-hungry peasantry, chronic food deficit and the spectre of mass starvation and famine looming over parts of the country. Faced with similar challenges, post-war ‘developmental states’ followed the course of economic development based on a template of state-controlled economic designs for growth, investment and trade. However, despite the challenge of resettling millions of refugees following the bloody partition of the country, war against Pakistan, and a violent peasant uprising in the South, the government of India, under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru, decided to open up all aspects of politics to democratic consultation. Many specialists of the time, including Barrington Moore and Gunnar Myrdal considered a ‘soft-state’, whose power and legitimacy derived from popular consent, to be ill-equipped to take hard decisions such as land reforms, and industrial growth. Contrary to such pessimistic prognoses, India has held together as a strong, stable, emerging economy. One can infer the strength and ingenuity of the Indian model in meeting the twin imperative of growth and justice from the steady growth of Indian economy and democratic consolidation over the past seven decades since Independence.

Unpacking the Double Movement

It has been claimed that against the assault by the market, which has made labour and land as fictitious commodities, a Polanyian counter movement is occurring, demanding stability and protection through state regulation of the market forces. Protests against forced land acquisition have been pointed out as evidence to this counter movement. In India, this counter movement against land acquisition succeeded in persuading the ruling United Progressive Alliance to pass the new Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Resettlement and Rehabilitation Act, which introduced legal safety nets to protect the rural population, including the landless, from the harmful effects of land acquisition. A close investigation of these protests in India, however, complicates the conception of a double movement. Instead of resisting commodification of land, in many instances protestors’ demands were for making land a free commodity in the market and insertion into neoliberal developmental projects. I capture some of these contradictions in this chapter and link them to farmers’ interactions with markets, money, and the state prior to land acquisition. The evidence for this chapter is from field observations and interviews in Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh state in India, secondary literature and news reports.

How the Market Mechanism Can Be Utilized in Land Acquisition

This chapter looks into the effectiveness of land markets in the process of land acquisition by discussing two case studies. The first includes the land acquisition in Foshan New Town, Guangdong (China), and the second is GIGC Sanand project, Gujarat (India). In these two cases, land acquisition for urban/industrial development did not result in furious confrontations between the government and landowners due to the creative measures taken by the local authorities. The landowners got adequate compensations and in some instances even enjoyed a share of the developmental benefit. They thus welcomed rather than resisted the developmental projects. I argue that effective land markets contribute to a more inclusive development, which provides a direction for further improvement in land acquisition regimes.

Land, Poverty, and Displacement

The present chapter shows why the problem of displacement deserves special focus in discourses on poverty and underdevelopment. The context is India. We argue that poverty in India is caused both by an aggregate scarcity of food in the country as well as a skewed distribution of income. There are two ways of getting out of the problem: (i) increase in food grains production by increasing productivity and (ii) increasing the pace of industrialization. To increase productivity it is necessary to build large irrigation facilities, which are likely to displace people and increase poverty. Similarly, transformation of land from agriculture to industry and infrastructure displaces people from their traditional livelihood and may temporarily increase poverty.

Land in India

Land markets in India continue the elusive search for price discovery as determined by market forces. The LARR of 2013 has planted a floor on land prices. The role of state governments has become central to acquisition, or purchase, of land as a financially weak private industry has little access to credit. Outright purchase of land is stressing state finances and creating perverse incentives for hoarding. As states seek to work out their own land rules, it is essential for them to converge to a common ground for amending the jagged edges of LARR 2013. Major political parties like BJP and Congress should abandon the political optics of upholding LARR 2013 just on ‘pro-farmer’ grounds and work with states in a politically neutral fashion to seek such ground. Innovative ideas like whether bringing in land and real estate within GST can improve land purchase capacities must also be examined.