between preservation of the environment and economic development has not
proved easy or uncontroversial, as the Vedanta and Posco project operations in
the state of Orissa show.^100 The Planning Commission has set the following targets
for the eleventh five-year plan: to increase forest and tree cover by five percentage
points, to attain the WHO standards of air quality in all major cities by 2011 – 12 ,to
treat all urban waste water by 2011 – 12 in order to clean river waters, and to increase
energy efficiency by 20 per cent by 2016 – 17.^101
Acquisition of land by the government for development purposes raises a
number of human rights issues and has proved to be quite controversial in the
recent past, e.g. the acquisition of land by the West Bengal government in Singur
for Tata’s car manufacturing unit.^102 Currently, this power is governed by the Land
Acquisition Act of 1894. This law empowers the government to acquire
private land ‘for public purposes’ or ‘for companies’ by following the procedure
laid down therein and on payment of compensation. The government had intro-
duced a bill in 2007 to address some of the criticisms levelled against its land
acquisition practices.
103
The bill, however, lapsed. The government has now
introduced the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill 2011.
104
This bill seeks
to ensure a humane, participatory, informed, consultative and trans-
parent process for land acquisition for industrialisation, development
of essential infrastructural facilities and urbanisation with the least
disturbance to the owners of the land and other affected families and
provide just and fair compensation to the affected families whose land
has been acquired.^105
It also proposes ‘to make adequate provisions for such affected persons for their
rehabilitation and resettlement’.
There are several other bills on important issues that have been introduced and/
or passed in parliament in the last few years. The National Food Security Bill 2013
seeks to provide adequate and safe food to the selected groups of people ‘through-
out the life cycle’ (i.e. from pregnancy to old age). Special provisions are proposed
to ensure a supply of free food to destitutes, homeless people, those affected by
disaster or people living in starvation. If properly implemented, this law should go a
long way toward providing food to a significant population that stands to be
excluded from reaping the benefits of the free-market economy.
(^100) See International Commission of Jurists (ICJ),Access to Justice: Human Rights Abuses
Involving Corporations – India(Geneva: ICJ, 2011 ), pp. 44 – 7 , 70 – 2.
(^101) Planning Commission of India,Mid-term Appraisal,p. 453.
(^102) See Suchita Mazumdar, ‘Development through displacement: a study of Singur, West
Bengal’, in K.R. Gupta (ed.),Special Economic Zones: Issues, Laws and Procedures(New
Delhi: Atlantic Publishers, 2008 ), p. 88.
(^103) See ICJ,Access to Justice,p. 67. (^104) Bill No 77 of 2011. (^105) Ibid., Long Title.