Statecraft lessons in Land Act defeat

Since December last year, the Narendra Modi government made numerous attempts to pass its own version of the land acquisition law by jettisoning key provisions of the legislation passed during the UPA dispensation in 2013. This was sought to be done through the ordinance route since the ruling combine did not have the needed strength in the Rajya Sabha to see the measure through. After its first introduction, the ordinance was re-issued twice. With time, the government evidently thought, it would be able to neutralise political Opposition and win over allies.

This was not to be. Even BJP’s allies in the government, notably the Shiv Sena and Akali Dal, could not be persuaded of the merits of the revamped land acquisition law that government leaders — especially Prime Minister Modi — sought to push. This was suggestive of the fact that the government’s Lok Sabha numbers may indeed be suspect on this particular issue.

Indeed, the government quailed in the face of the Congress campaign spearheaded by Rahul Gandhi, that the NDA move was not only wrong-headed, but was consciously “anti-farmer” in order to be pro-industrialist.

On Friday, the government announced it would allow the ordinance to lapse. Better sense has prevailed in the run-up to the Bihar Assembly election, although this is the first political defeat of the government by a determined Opposition since the BJP stormed the bastion under Mr Modi’s leadership.

Without being sympathetic to the socio-economic ramifications of the law passed by the Congress-led UPA regime in 2013 — which emphasised the consent of farmers before their lands would be acquired for private enterprise and issues relating to rehabilitation of those uprooted in the process — the government did seem over-keen to please industry which has been bitterly complaining that shortage of land was becoming a constraint and that the 2013 law made acquiring land for industry a costly proposition.

The course the government has now adopted is to let land acquisition be a process to be undertaken by state governments according to their own rules. This seems a tenable proposition which flows from the 2013 Act. However, the experience of the Modi government — from the first promulgation of the ordinance to its withdrawal — shows that a comfortable position in the Lok Sabha does not grant a government the latitude to act in ways that may be dismissive of dissent. The art of negotiation and compromise remain key assets for those wielding power.