‘Agri land can only be sold to agriculturists’
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Nov 2: The Jammu and Kashmir Government today allayed apprehensions about new Land Laws including sale of agriculture land declaring it categorically that no agricultural land can be transferred to any person from outside the Union Territory and that it can only be sold to an agriculturist within the UT.
This was stated at a press conference today by the UT Government spokesman and Principal Secretary Information and Power Development Department Rohit Kansal.
“No agriculture land can be transferred to any person from outside the UT of J&K. Agriculture land can only be sold to an agriculturist from within Jammu and Kashmir. Even non-agriculturists from within Jammu and Kashmir are barred from purchasing agriculture land. Terms agricultural land and agriculturist have been defined to include not just agriculture but horticulture and allied agro-activities as well,” Kansal said. Click here to watch video
He said the safeguard on agricultural land alone would ensure that more than 90 percent of land in the UT which is agricultural land remained protected with the people of J&K.
The Government spokesman said there have been protections and safeguard including Sections 133 A-L. A number of protections have been built into the new land laws on similar lines as have been enacted in other States like Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
On strategic areas, Kansal said Section 3 has nothing to do with the transfer of any land to the Armed Force. The transfer, both acquisition or requisitions, will continue to be governed by the existing law and the norms on the subject, he added.
“It merely exempted the Armed Forces from operation of such aspects of this Act so that the responsibility of ensuring that the construction activities are undertaken as per the Developmental Control Regulation of the Master Plan and all environmental safeguards are observed, has been delegated to the Armed Force themselves with sufficient safeguard that it will be only applicable on own/legally acquired land and on request from officer not below Corps Commander (Lieutenant General) for operational and training purposes,” he said.
He added that main objective of changes in the laws are to provide people of Jammu and Kashmir a modernized land management system which is people-friendly and bring in greater transparency.
“The Land Laws are major step towards development and progress of Jammu and Kashmir and they will revamp agriculture sector, lead to rapid industrialization, usher in land reforms and open up greater employment avenues for the youth,” Kansal said.
Kansal said the Government has repealed 11 Land Laws that existed in the erstwhile State of Jammu and Kashmir replacing the old, regressive, intrinsically contradictory and outdated laws.
Elaborating, Kansal remarked that the repealed laws were made to serve the old agrarian based economy and were required to be modified for modern economic needs. Besides, they were beset with ambiguities, contradictions and redundancies and in many cases, were clearly regressive.
For instance, a number of Laws had contradictions leading to scope for discretionary interpretation and rent seeking e.g. ‘Family’ was defined differently in different laws, provision of alienation and conversion of land were different in different Laws and the ceiling of 182 kanals fixed in Big Landed Estates Abolition Act was superseded by 100 standard kanals in the Agrarian Reforms act, 1976, yet both provisions continued to coexist creating contradiction and confusion.
The Prohibition of Conversion of Land and Alienation of Orchards Act, 1975 not only prohibited alienation of orchard lands; it surprisingly restricted creation of new orchards too. Similarly, the old Agrarian Reforms Act prohibited the selling of land distributed to tillers even after 44 years. The Right of Prior Purchase Act severely constrained an owner’s right to dispose off his own property.
“The new provisions not only address the infirmities in the old set of laws but also provide for modern and enabling provisions to aid in the agricultural and industrial growth of the UT of J&K. While progressive provisions of the repealed laws have been retained by including them in the modified Land Revenue Act, new provisions have been added to modernize existing laws. There are now provisions for setting up of a Board of Revenue, Regional planning for regulating use of land, alienation and conversion, land lease, consolidation and Contract Farming. The Board of Revenue comprising senior officers will not only be the Developing Authority for preparing regional plans but can notify a scheme of consolidation of land holdings and also a scheme for restricting and regulating the fragmentation of agricultural land holdings to make agriculture viable,” Kansal said.
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