Farmers force Mayawati to take a step back

Unrelenting farmers in western Uttar Pradesh forced chief minister Mayawati to take a step back and announce major changes in land acquisition policy on Friday, so that the Yamuna Expressway project could be executed.

Mayawati also drop one of the five hi-tech township projects in Tappal, Aligarh.

 “The state government has solved land-related problems of farmers of Aligarh and Agra…farmers have been given adequate compensation and they have also accepted it, but opposition parties are trying to vitiate the law and order there,” Mayawati said in a statement read out by cabinet secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh.

Under the new policy, a farmer whose land is acquired would be paid Rs20,000 per acre, per annum for 33 years, but he would also have the option of a one-time payment of Rs2.40 lakh per hectare. The annuity would be increased by Rs600 every year and payable every July. The farmer would also have the option to hold 25% share of the land acquired by the company. The farmers would be allotted seven % of the acquired land for residential purposes.

“We have also tackled the problem of farmers being rendered landless and losing their sole means of livelihood after the government acquires their land,” Singh said. One-time labour charges of Rs1.85 lakh, which is equivalent to daily wages of agriculture labour for five years, would be paid to every farmer family, he said.

“Our government and party are totally against the forceful acquisition of farmers’ land. Previous governments at the Centre are responsible for the poor condition of farmers and the problem of Maoism… farmers are forced to take to the roads to get their problems solved due to flaws in the Land Acquisition Act,” Mayawati said.