By Ruma Dubey

The Govt is planning to bludgeon its way through Bills using the Ordinance route. With no support expected from the Rajya Sabha, more than legislation, it will be an ‘executive’ type of working, where irrespective of the voices of dissent, all efforts will be made to progress ahead. That is indeed a good move if we are looking at development and growth. Ironical though is the fact that the very same party called UPAs move to pass the anti-graft Bill using the Ordinance route as ‘anti-constitutional.’

But at the very same time, it goes on to show the decay which has set into our democracy. It shows that Govt is using a route when in an emergency and in many ways, this is a sign of weakness and not strength. At the same time, the Govt can kid itself thinking that FIIs will come investing once the Ordinance is through. Of course not! They know that an Ordinance also needs legislation and that too within six months. If that period lapses, the Ordinance will have to be re-issued. The process can go on and on. If Ordinances are becoming a substitute for legislation, doesn’t it indicate a very deep-rooted, putrid decay in the entire process of our democracy. Why not a Joint Session route instead of this Ordinance? If Lok Sabha, where BJP has the strength, passes the Bill, a Joint Session would have been the best way head to get legislation at one go.

As stated earlier, more than FDI in insurance, of utmost importance is the Land Bill. Major infra projects are today stuck mainly on account of non-availability of land. And starting 1^st Jan 2014, the new Land Bill replaced the 120 old draconian land law. Yet, companies continue to find it next to impossible to acquire land and they blame it all on one law – the Right to Fair and Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013.

Under this Act, the interest of the poor land owner and even those dependent on the land is protected. It also ordered compulsory consent from 70% of affected people for land acquired for public private partnership (PPP) projects and 80% consent for private companies.

A quick look at the highlights of the current Land Bill in place:

• Compensations have been upped - up to 4 times the market value in rural areas and 2 times the market value in urban areas.
• Consent of 80% of land owners required for acquiring land for private projects and of 70% landowners for public-private projects.
• Unless and until all the Resettlement and Rehabilitation (R&R) payments have been made and alternate arrangements made, no one can remove the landowners.
• To address historical injustice the Bill applies retrospectively to cases where no land acquisition award has been made.
• Consent required of Gram Sabhas when land is in Scheduled areas
  States to impose limits on the area under agricultural cultivation that can be acquired – this is to prevent arbitrary acquisition and safeguard food security
• States empowered to return the land to either the owner or the state land bank if land remains unutilized after acquisition – this puts into perspective the entire Tata Motors – Singur land debate
• If acquired land is sold to third party, if profit being made is 40% of the originally paid price, this profit has to be shares with the original owner. This would be exempt from tax and stamp duty  – this is something which will get twisted because even if profit is above 40%, no one will show that on paper.
• Bill defines "public purpose" to include - mining, infrastructure, defence, manufacturing zones, roads, railways, highways, and ports built by government and public sector enterprises, land for project-affected people, planned development and improvement of village or urban sites and residential purposes for the poor and landless and government-administered schemes or institutions, among others.
• Provisions of this Bill shall not apply to acquisitions under 16 existing legislations including the Special Economic Zones Act, 2005, the Atomic Energy Act, 1962, the Railways Act, 1989, etc.
   

And now areas where the Ordinance is required to rush through the amended Land Bill.

• Current Land Bill in place provides for excluding 13 central legislation, including Land Acquisition (Mines) Act 1885, Atomic Energy Act, 1962, Railway Act 1989, National Highways Act 1956 and Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978 from its purview. So unless Ordinance is issued before 1^st Jan 2015, these 13 legislations will also come under the purview of the the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013. At this juncture, the Govt simply cannot afford to have this.
• Remove large infra and PPP projects out of the purview of the mandatory Social Impact Assessment (SIA) clause and needs to be completed within a time frame of six months. This SIA is a practice followed world over. It is a very important clause as it assesses whether the proposed acquisition serves public purpose, an estimate of project affected families (PAFs) and of the extent of land to be affected by the acquisition.

The Govt has stated that these two amendments are needed as they are the one’s causing huge delays in land acquisition.  

Time is running short and the Govt needs to act fast least it loses the faith it received in the mandate.  Many in India Inc have already indicated that the Modi wave is on the wane as during the past few months, it has only tinkered with already existing reforms, doing no out-of-the-box bold thinking one expected it to. Maybe pushing through reforms through the Ordinance route is its way to tackle this criticism.

Let us now wait for the New Year and ‘bold’ reforms promised by the Govt.