Other States - Rajasthan   

Move to lease out land to private parties draws flak

Special Correspondent

JAIPUR: The proposed move of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Government in Rajasthan to lease out 57-lakh hectares of wasteland to private parties for cultivation of crops to generate bio-diesel has come in for flak from the Congress and civil rights groups Suchna Evum Rozgar Ka Adhikar Abhiyan and Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS).

While the Congress has demanded that the State Government distribute wasteland to landless farmers, the two civil rights bodies on Sunday condemned the move to hand over precious public land resources to private companies, saying it was a clear indication of the BJP's "lop-sided priorities" that favoured private interests and further impoverished the poor.

Social activist Aruna Roy, in a statement issued on behalf of the Abhiyan and MKSS, said this would accentuate inequalities in society by snatching away land from farmers and peasants on the one hand and "fattening the purses of greedy corporates and private parties" on the other.

"Did the people of the State fight feudalism only to see it creep up in even more malicious ways, this time with the outrageous support of the Government," said Ms. Roy, while pointing out that the Cabinet decision should be seen along with the acquisition of large tracts of land from farmers to sell to private companies for setting up special economic zones.

Ms. Roy said lakhs of poor families across the State were facing continuous harassment and legal action for the smallest of encroachments on so called wasteland. This wasteland was in fact the collective resource of the people of rural Rajasthan, used for a variety of common property needs.

The Abhiyan's statement pointed out that much of the land was already under some form of use, where there would now be stiff people's resistance to the allotments to private companies. "We want to know, how the decision to allot is taken with such ease and without debate, while it remains a mammoth, lifetime struggle for the poor to get a few bighas that will give them a life of dignity," said Ms. Roy.

Pradesh Congress Committee president B.D. Kalla charged over the week-end that the State Government's move to distribute wasteland was yet another attempt to help vested interests to "usurp" public land. The Government's land deals in the past too had been clouded in controversies, he said referring to the allocation for SEZ near Jaipur and the land given to the Deendayal Upadhyay Trust.

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