Farmers across
the country have a lot more of their plate than just the present agitation. They
are losing more to roads and highways or expressways than the mere MSP
guarantee they are demanding or repeal of the Centre’s three farm laws. The ten
new expressways proposed around the country and industrial corridors would be
creating land sharks by acquisition of at least 25 per cent of more farmlands
than required for each project and it can lead to enormous disaster and
financial mess.
Former Prime
Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s Golden Quadrilateral highway dream project was
for a specific purpose— bolstering the
country’s infrastructure. But sadly it has degraded into a land-grabbing
movement. The rouge of infrastructure building is virtually a sham if the
Agra-Noida JP Infratech Yamuna expressway (YE) is taken as a test case. It has
3500 acre of the 6177 acre acquired unutilised – 56.6 per cent. The 165 km road
itself as per calculations needed no more than 4500 acre. In fact, the project
conceptualised by Uttar Pradesh government in 2001 emerged as the model for
grabbing people’s land for private profits. All subsequent road projects
virtually have emulated it to create a new zamindari,
a fear expressed at a national discussion at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi on
freeing urban and rural ceilings in 1994.
Now on December
21, 2020, YE industrial development authority (Yeida) CEO Arun Vir Singh says
that it has notified 256,862 hectares (6.3 lakh acre) for development and has
acquired 12,481 hectares (30841acre) for various developmental projects – all
of that is agriculture or wetland – in Gautam Buddh Nagar, Aligarh, Mathura and
Agra.
The project also
busts the myth that the public sector is inefficient. As huge tract of land is
acquired by JP Infratech and it gets into Rs 6500 crore debt to settle the
tangle public sector National Buildings Construction Corporation Ltd (NBCC) is
roped in. How much the public sector has lost for rescuing the prime acquirers
and some others like Amrapali needs to be assessed. It is also a case of where
thousands of home seekers have lost their life’s savings amounting to thousands
of crore.
The NBCC, in turn, has told the public sector banks to raise about Rs 2,000 crore against the
expressway and provide half of the amount (Rs 1,000 crore) to the State-owned
company, which would utilise the fund for an upfront payment and kick-start construction.
The NBCC will not repay the loans in cash but would give 100 per cent equity to
lenders (banks). So it is people’s deposits that are being put to speculative
risks with uncertain chances of return.
There is a myth
in western UP that the compensation, peanuts as per market valuation, has
improved quality of life of the farmer families as the project displaced them
with “rich” benefits. It does not assess the fact that the loss it has caused
to farm production, greenery and increased pollution in the National Capital Region
(NCR) fall in the quality of life farm families. Many have squandered it away or
just been reduced to labourers. Large slums have started growing.
It’s also a
wonder why after a few years of the start of the project NBCC has to step in.
The project is virtually financially, ecologically and socially an example of
how a company can botch up a simple issue for its greed.
The JP Infratech
has 3500 acre of land of the 6177 acre acquired unutilized. This is now being
told to NBCC to acquire and manage. Is the public sector a hospital to rescue a
private company that has caused untold human, financial and ecological hazard
at stone’s throw from the national Capital?
The toll roads
are not masterpieces of Indian civilization. The national highways to
Chandigarh, Jaipur, Aligarh and hosts of others across the country are
instances of how bad potholed roads have been levied toll to fleece people. The
chain of toll roads in NCR – Kundli-Manesar-Palwal, Delhi-Aligarh,
Delhi-Meerut, Delhi Baghpat, Delhi- Hardwar, Delhi-Hapur-Moradabad, eastern
Peripheral Highway, Delhi-Saharanpur highway are instances of dumping huge
costs on the NCR farmers and businesses and adding to inflation that causes
concern to RBI. Each of these is built on farmers’ lands acquired for peanuts
to bolster profits.
Each toll road
has become synonymous with unending loot. The DND – or the Noida toll bridge
lost the toll status at the intervention of the court as it had recovered more
than it had invested on construction and maintenance in three years. The wonder that has not become the standard for awarding future such roads. Now the
licence for toll collection is being given for 30 to 36 years – more than a
generation. One such emerging monopoly belongs to an influential politician and
many others also have similar connections in every region.
Minister for Road
Transport & Highways Nitin Gadkri says India has now the second largest
road network of expressways and highways. It is expanding at 30 km of road
building a day. But he ignores the World Bank (WB) report of February 2020 on Roads
in India that says the country has one of the worst roads and has the highest
road crashes killing 1.5 lakh people a year and injuring or maiming more than
five times. (The YE is supposedly the most accident-prone. The conditions of
state highways are far worse).
The WB says it
costs the economy between three to five per cent of GDP, almost Rs 7 lakh
crore. India’s real GDP at constant prices (2011-12) is 140.78 lakh crore in
2018-19, as per the ministry of statistics and programme implementation.
So for corporate
greed the country is building unsafe roads and people are being saddled with
huge costs and increasing insurance premium. What started as a loss to farmers
has engulfed the entire society and the profits of the perpetrators are
increasing. The unnecessary supposedly high-security plates for 26 crore
vehicles are boosting their profits by a minimum of Rs 10,000 crore and
displacing lakhs of mohalla level poor number plate makers across the country.
This monopolisation is another bane.
Greed is not
only driving out the farmers but also various poor workers around him who have
been subsisting on-farm activities. The country needs to study the phenomenon
and act to prevent the situation from further aggravating.
The loss of arable land for a scramble of “bad
development” can be socially and politically disastrous. The mad game for the acquisition of fertile land must stop and the government has to look back to
have a holistic agriculture and growth (not development) policy.
Author
Shivaji
Sarkar
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