Farmers' discontent over land pooling for urban estates highlights need for new policy

By Bharat Dogra 

Recent reports from various parts of Punjab, including Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Phagwara, and Hoshiarpur, indicate growing farmer mobilization against the state government's land-pooling policy for urban estate development. This opposition isn't isolated; similar sentiments are surfacing across the country. Furthermore, indiscriminate and profit-driven urbanization has led to widespread ecological damage, including blocked natural drainage and destructive floods.

This article proposes an alternative: a highly democratic, transparent, and participatory approach to urbanization that can prevent such discontent and environmental degradation.

A Participatory Approach to Urbanization

Village panchayats, or elected village councils, can initiate a consultative process to identify farmers willing to sell land for urbanization within a specified price range. This ensures that only voluntary sales occur, leaving unwilling farmers undisturbed. Subsequently, through similar consultative methods and collaborative dialogue, the community can creatively decide how to best utilize the available land, even if it's spread across multiple locations. This approach encourages the development of several smaller, more aesthetically pleasing housing clusters rather than a single, large skyscraper complex.

To illustrate, consider a village with 200 households, 100 of which are farming families with an average of 5 acres each, totaling 500 acres of farmland. If, say, 50 acres are voluntarily offered for urban-style housing and related development, 450 acres would remain for farming, thus preserving the village's essential rural and green character.

Economic and Community Benefits

Suppose this 50-acre parcel is used to provide quality urban housing for approximately 200 outsider households, each with an average budget of INR 5 million for a house, totaling INR 1000 million. The panchayat could then allocate about 20% of this to land sellers, 60% to house construction, and roughly 20% (around INR 200 million) to community development projects. These projects could include water conservation, building paths and roads, installing renewable energy sources, tree planting, creating biodiversity parks, and implementing skill development programs for villagers, with a special focus on landless households. This is in addition to the panchayat's regular development budgets, which should continue to be used judiciously.

The arrival of 200 additional families would create numerous new livelihood opportunities and a guaranteed market for daily farm produce like vegetables, fruits, and milk. Farmers could adopt natural farming practices, reducing costs and providing healthy food that new settlers would likely purchase at a premium. The new residents' contacts could also help find new customers in nearby cities.

House buyers could make payments over a period of about three years during the construction phase. While panchayats can engage external professional help, including government agencies, for construction, they should prioritize employing local people. The entire process must be highly transparent, with social auditing complementing regular checks and balances.

By allowing villagers to participate in selecting housing sites, it can be ensured that developments align with local needs, such as not obstructing water drainage.

This approach fosters urbanization that coexists peacefully with villages, rather than disrupting rural life. Instead, it contributes to the creation of better, more integrated villages.

---

The writer is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now. His recent books include Saving Earth for Children, A Day in 2071, Navjeevan, and Planet in Peril