January 2008 Edition
When a
company’s lease
expires who
gets the land?
Civil Society News
Chengara (Kerala)/New Delhi
SINCE August 2007, around 5,000 Dalit, Adivasi and OBC families have been living in makeshift tents on the Harrisons Malayalam Estate (Plantations) at Chengara, in Kerala’s Pathanamthitta district. They have braved the monsoon, a chikangunya epidemic and threats from estate workers. These families are saying they want the estate’s 6,000 hectares to be fairly distributed amongst them. The lease held by Harrisons for the 6,000 hectares in Chengara expired in 1996. The agitators say the government promised to hand over the land to landless Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs, but didn’t do so.“We are demanding a minimum of two acres of agricultural land for landless people.
Till the government meets our demand, we will not go back. You can lathicharge us, shoot us or do whatever, the people are determined to get killed,” said Laha Gopalan, leader of the Sadhujana Vimochana Samyuktha Vedi (SJVSV), which is at the forefront of the agitation. Harrisons Malayalam Plantations, part of the RPG group, are the largest private land-holding company in Kerala. It has 33 estates (tea and rubber) of not less than 50,000 acres in six districts of Kerala. The company takes land on lease and then sublets it, which is illegal, it is alleged.“Our demands are very clear,” said Gopalan.“We are not begging any estate owner or state government. We are taking back what was looted from us generations ago. If you try to stop us, we will have no option but to die for our land, as it is a better death than dying due to starvation.” Successive governments have failed to address the issue of landlessness amongst Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs despite a rising tide of agitations. In February 2006, tribals were shot at by the police when they tried to reclaim their land in Muthunga, Wayanad district, though the government had promised them land rights.The Muthunga episode has become a landmark in the history of people’s struggle for land. In Kerala, 85 per cent of landless people are Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs. The state’s land reform movement left them out. They merely got squatting rights. Earlier, in the 50s some of them got small pieces of land but it was insufficient for families to live in. According to government figures Dalits are huddled in around 12,500 colonies occupying 3 and 5 cents (one cent is 1/100th of an acre).
“The only concessions we are enjoying for the last 30 to 40 years is the allocation of 3 cents of land per Dalit/Adivasi family,” says Gopalan. “Those who have not even been provided with this have been forced to seek shelter in the outskirts and rocky highlands. Our demand is not just for land to build one room houses. We are essentially demanding cultivable land for agriculture.” On September 27, the agitators were told by Revenue Minister KP Rajendran that land would be provided to the landless. “You should understand that this was also the election manifesto promise of the CPI-M, that the company lands that are under lease will be re-distributed to the landless for agriculture,” says Gopalan. But the state government, once again, went back on its word. “We were expecting the Left Front overnment led by the CPI-M to be friendly to Kerala’s landless who have been for years their votaries,” says a disappointed Gopalan. Efforts to restart talks have been turned down. The police have arrested some people on the estate. Trade unions have been hostile. Harrisons Malayalam Plantations claims it owns the rubber trees on the plantation. It approached the High Court to clear the space of ‘encroachers’.
The company has now got an order from the court telling the government to peacefully evict the families in the next three months. Any violence from the state will result in huge bloodshed. According to a 29 September report by Nivedita P Haran, revenue secretary to the Kerala government, the plantation company has more than 70,000 acres in its possession whereas the company according to documents can lay claim to only 59,000 acres. The company has more than 11,000 acres which it is holding illegally. The Cabinet has appointed a sub-committee of ministers to take appropriate decisions in a month’s time. The Cabinet on December 6 appointed survey officers at the district level to work out the illegally occupied land by Harrisons Malayalam Plantations and to retrieve it in two months time. The Chief Minister affirmed that the government will recover from the company, “thousands of acres of land held illegitimately after the expiry of its lease rights over the properties.” But activists believe that the state government wants to acquire the land and pass it on to other industries. There is talk of a new land act to make land available without ceiling to industry and this is probably the reason for the state government’s cold shoulder. The irony is that the government is always eager to hand over land for a pittance to big companies. Companies may misuse land, cause pollution, or run losses. But land is never acquired back and returned to the people.
(Based on material received from MJ Joseph and Vijayan MJ of the Delhi Forum.)
Want to give feedback on this article |
Disclaimer
The views expressed here are strictly personal and civilsocietyonline.com does not necessarily subscribe to them. We shall endeavour to upload/publish as many of the comments that are submitted as possible within a reasonable span of time, but we do not guarantee that all comments that are submitted will be uploaded/published. Messages that harass, abuse or threaten other members; have obscene, unlawful, defamatory, libellous, hateful, or otherwise objectionable content; or have spam, commercial or advertising content or links are liable to be removed by the editors. We also reserve the right to edit the comments that do get published. Please do not post any private information unless you want it to be available publicly.
Your Feedback on this story...
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
About Us | Site Map | Privacy Policy | Contact Us | ©2007 Civil Society
.
........................................Webmaster Vishwanathan ( vishu4@rediffmail.com )