Monday 18 June 2007

What do you have to say about SEZ's and land encroachment

Hi

Nandigram has stirred a lot of people to start thinking. If you have any views or opinions on the specific incident, or on SEZ's in general, or on land acquisition/encroachment for any other reason like dams (Narmada), then please do share your thoughts with me by replying to this post. I'm all ears!!!

Thanks
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5 comments:

  1. ishani18 June 2007 at 22:36

    it will be my pleaure to share my views on land acqisition with u...
    first i share with u a case study of land acquisition in kolkata...
    here in north kolkata there is a big mkt. where a huge no. vendors gather and sell mostly all non-durable goods..the mkt. is existing from the last 150 yrs. & has acquired a similar to heritage status. hence the owner is debarred from selling it to anyone..
    Now Reliance Fresh desperately wanted that place to further its business interests in kolkata..
    what it did was to lure the govt. here to purchase it any how..
    now the govt. manipulated things & purchased the mkt...
    this was done exclusively for reliance..

    now come 2 obvious things..
    1. The govt. has been financially benefitted
    2. the vendors will be soon evicted

    but the surprising thing this that there is no uproar from anyfront..
    the underneath truth is that reliance is paying huuuuuge amt. to the vendors to evict the place...

    so where is our country heading forward...?
    i think very soon it will be very difficult to run small businesses in india..
    it all started with mac donald & others & will continue with reliance,wallmart etc...

    so what about the poor...?
    i think we need to think differently..
    we all concern that the poor will lose his job..
    what if our country loses all its poor..?

    so instead of caring about poor man's job lets think more broadly & rather do things to deny a poor man his title...

    i think i have said enough..
    bye

    Pradip

    ReplyDelete
  2. ishani18 June 2007 at 22:47

    Hi Pradip

    Thanks for your opinion. You have a point there. But do you really think that such monopolisation will ultimately in the end trickle down to benefit the poor in such a way that they will be rid of their title. Maybe...though I do have my reservations. Maybe a pro-active government aiming at overall development and not just large businesses development could have a major role to play. At least in West Bengal, the government doesn't seem to be such. Hence there is at least the need of public criticism to keep the government in check. waht say, eh?

    Rest, I agree with you that developing businesses is not a completely bad thing and might be beneficial for all. My only addition to that viewpoint is that the benefits lie hidden there along with the curses. The organisation must make policies to be able to tap the benefits while mitigating the curses.

    Thanks for your valuable comments.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Unknown19 June 2007 at 10:36

    Hi, ishani
    this is jagdish and instead of sharing any incidence regarding this. I want to share my views with you on this matter. I just want to ask the question that how can the policy makers deprive the one section of society(farmers) in lure to FDI? If they really want to setup their plant then why not they look at other wasteland. I am agree that this investment at the end will benefit not only to these farmers but to all the people of nation but there also are some disadvantages of this as well. It will reduce the production of agricultrual products as well distort the income level of the nation.
    All this points were in my mind and i wamt that govt. also look at this points as well those points which i skip from this.
    Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  4. ishani19 June 2007 at 11:03

    Hi Ishani....

    Such a quick reply...!
    well i will like to address some of the concerns u have raised...

    1. I think that the govt. should act as a faciliator of things...a neutral administrative body...that is trying to ensure that no side while making the deal break the law of the land..
    Why i say thi is because u also might have noted that the govt. in most cases takes the side of one party & that makes the environment uncompetitive

    2. I personally think that as the tendency of big mkt. players to enter the retail sector continues the poor vendor need not worry...
    for e.g. when mac donald entered India it was one national newspapers the headline.."Death of the Indian Halwai" ..But nothing as such as happened.

    3. So i am not against Reliance acquiring the mkt. I mentioned..
    My only concerns are..:
    A. That the law of the land was not adhered to & hence they have been evicted by "money power"

    Pradip

    ReplyDelete
  5. Unknown19 June 2007 at 17:30

    Hello Ishaani
    I would like to throw some light on a ongoing iron and steel project in Orissa worth US $12 billion in context of SEZ's.I hope you know about POSCO(Pohang Iron & Steel Company),a company based in the Republic of Korea,which has been approved of SEZ from Paradip to Gopalpur.It involves compulsory land acquisition and compensation for estimated 4000 displaced families that, in some cases lack land title documentation.The point which I am trying to bring out is that even though compensation package is generous but what would the paupers do once the money runs out.Another point is that POSCO will provide one job per family, but farming and fishing keep the entire community employed. One very crucial point to note is that people are anticipated to be compensated for private land only.The land under betel nut cultivation is registered as govt. land (i.e. land which is freely accessible to people for farming)residents of which in all probability will not get compensation for it.
    So, I hope you find these points relevant.
    Bye.

    ReplyDelete

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