NITI Aayog working on agri-land lease law for farm income

Land lease to help farmers to migrate to other occupations, reduce fallow lands

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With increasing incidents of suicide and growing debt among farmers in the country, government's think tank – NITI Aayog – has found a solution for regular income for the farmers i.e. agriculture land leasing. NITI Aayog has formed an expert committee that would be working to formulate a model agriculture land leasing law.
The ten-member committee, headed by former commissioner for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) and director of Council for Social Development (CSD) Dr T Haque, would submit its report by December to the NITI Aayog. The committee has also been asked to suggest amendments keeping in view the need to liberalise land leasing for agriculture efficiency, equity, occupational diversification and rapid rural transformation. The committee has already held first round of talks with chief secretaries of seven states who are also committee members and may involve chief secretaries from other states for consultations too.
Talking to dna, an official from the NITI Aayog on condition of anonymity said, "The focus right now is on agriculture land leasing for farming only, but we could also look at leasing land for industrial purpose too. With land acquisition becoming difficult due to stiff political opposition and farmer resistance, land leasing could be one of the best ways forward."
"NITI Aayog vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya also thinks so," he says adding that "Small-scale farming is becoming unviable and with at least leasing farmland, farmers can get assured income. Since everything would be in black and white, it would help them to reserve their rights. BJP state governments too seem to like the idea."
However, committee chairman Dr T Haque, said, "Our mandate is to just look at land leasing for agriculture purpose only and no directions have come for industrial purpose. Agriculture land leasing will help in three ways as it will help in improving productivity, will give access to credit and crop insurance to lease holders and better utilization of land and labour."
He adds that with this, farmers can get atleast regular income and risk would be forwarded to the lease holder.
There are various mechanisms to assure that agriculture land is used for farming only. "There could be ceiling on the land that a person can take on lease. It would be a simple model frame work facilitating state governments."
On question of whether the move will help contract farming in the country by corporate, he said, "It is too soon. Let us work on the model and develop it."
He refused to comment further.
Land being a state subject, it's the prerogative of state government to decide on whether to allow leasing agriculture land by farmers or not. At present the country has a wide variation in agriculture land leasing.
For example in North Eastern states like Nagaland, no one holds the land rights. The land rights are with the village community which is headed by village chief or king. He is the one who decides how much land is to be given to a person for cultivation.
Similarly, in states like Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka, agriculture land leasing is illegal except certain categories of people who are allowed to lease out land. These are widows, minors, physically challenged people and those working in armed forces. In the states of Kerala, Manipur and Jammu and Kashmir, leasing out of agriculture land is banned legally.