Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar must be careful with his words because they are running out of logic. Let’s recall his comments made during his meeting the NITI Ayog in Delhi, on compensation to people, mainly farmers, who are ousted from the lands due to land acquisition for major projects, supposedly in public interest. The CM’s words, “The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 is slowing down the pace of development in the State.”
Before we get into a debate on the issue itself, let’s look at the statement itself. The CM is actually saying that fair compensation and transparency in land acquisition is slowing down development in Goa. The inference then is for fast paced development you cannot have fair compensation and transparency. But if you cannot have fair compensation and transparency, you cannot have the words ‘Rehabilitation’ and ‘Resettlement’ in the ‘Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013’. This is because the genesis of Rehabilitation and Resettlement is fair compensation. How can you expect Rehabilitation and Resettlement of people who are losing their lands if their lives are not better, their traditional occupations – mainly agriculture – is protected by being given equally fertile land and their earnings are fixed not only at current rates but according to an amount which would enable them to better their lifestyles and livelihoods through the compensation alone, by absorbing inflation.
What Goa Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar is advocating is deleting fairness because it comes in the way of development. While this may be shocking to most, it should hardly come as a surprise to those who have seen the ways of Mr Parsekar. The manner in which he has backed Leading Hotels, the proponents of the golf course and villas project in Tiracol, is ample indication that all he is interested in, is the galloping development of mega companies at the cost of land and livelihoods of ordinary Goans, even if they happen to be villagers from his own taluka.
With massive land acquisition which is in store to create more self contained industrial estates, highways and addition to infrastructure for the Mopa airport, the government doesn’t want to give fair compensation to oustees. Therefore the move to remove the consent clause and the social impact clause from the Act is logical for a government which wants to literally do away with people’s interests. At the same time it seeks to undermine local authorities like the gram sabhas and municipalities in the process of land acquisition.
Of course the BJP in opposition sang a different tune. The then General Secretary of the BJP (now MP) Shri Narendra Sawaikar had in a letter written on February 21, 2012, in response to a query by a Congressman, expressed the commitment of his party if elected to strengthen the institution of the Gram Sabhas.
The reality is that the ruling BJP is facing opposition from village panchayats and gram sabhas, because its TCP department has been giving consent to projects without taking villagers into confidence. While there is a lot that can be said of corruption in panchayats, no government can bypass the process of reaching out and taking consent of people whose lives will drastically alter because the government wants a project in their backyard.
That is why Mr Parsekar’s comments at the NITI AYOG meeting of Chief Ministers are condemnable. Are other Chief Ministers in a hurry to remove consent from the Land Acquisition process? Is Parsekar in a hurry because his Chief Ministerial lifespan is till 2017? Does he need to satisfy the parties he has committed projects to and given a package deal of handling people’s agitations for all of them?
It is natural that barring the first question whose answer will probably be no, the answers to all the others is likely to be in the affirmative. But he must understand that the word “development” which he is fighting for is very subjective. If he is looking for his own development at the cost of the reduction of the happiness quotient of his people, he will not be invited for any future NITI AYOG meetings. Because he will no longer be Chief Minister.
