Land Acquisition Act summary

The Land Acquisition Act, 2015

The present legislation has been introduced as a replacement to the age old Land Acquisition Act, 1894. 1894. Land Land Acqui Acquisi sitio tion n basical basically ly refers refers to ceasin ceasing g land land by the governm government ent from from privat privatee individuals for public purposes. The ne act, li!e the old one runs on the idea of eminent domain. The present act has come under fire for not adhering to international humanitarian standards. The  present Act has introduced provisions hich fare much better as compared to the 1894 Act, it is still not entirely ell suited to the needs of farmers and poor dellers. "#ubl "#ublic ic #urp #urpos ose$ e$ has been been defin defined ed in %ect %ectio ion n & of the the Act. ct. #rim #rimar aril ily y, the the act act allo allos s the the acquisition of land for public purposes. 't allos e(clusion of a number of requirements such as social impact assessment, acquisition of irrigation canal and consent for folloing categories) nation national al securi security ty and defens defense, e, indust industria riall corrid corridors ors,, rural rural and urban urban indust industria riali li*at *ation ion and affordable housing. %ince these three requirements are the only actual chec! on the misuse of  land acquisition there is a severe possibility for misuse in this case. There are no chec!s on the misuse of land. A number of times, the amount of land grabbed is far  more than hat is actually required. The e(tra land remains aste and unoccupied. There should  be chec!s against this because the harm done d one to the displaced d isplaced populations pop ulations cannot be undone. A lot of times, the people affected are not people ho are land oners but those ho are dependent on it for their livelihood livelihood such as landless landless or!ers etc. The compensation compensation for land does not ta!e into account the loss of livelihood to these groups. The ne act aims to do aay ith a number of shortcomings of the last act. The biggest problem in the old legislation as inadequate compensation. The ne act aims to rectify this. +o, if the land is being sei*ed for a publicprivate pro-ect then the consent of at least 8/ of the residents ill be required. The compensation also required a mar!up from the mar!et prices. This legislation has been seen as a political tool used by the nely instated +0A government. ritics say that land acquisition is not such a pertinent problem to the groth and development of  the country2 it is being portrayed as one.