5 consequences of failure of redistribution of land in India

The failure of land redistribution programme resulted in an inequitable distribution of land in the village economy and accentuated the gap between the rich and the poor. The following are the consequence of such a failure.
(i) Poverty and deprivation :
Land is the biggest productive asset in the countryside. The unequal distribution of land, therefore, resulted in concentration of land in a few hands, while a large number of people were landless and without having any productive asset to engage themselves. According to 1991 census, 74.6 million people are landless labourers having no land to cultivate. Further, they do not get regular employment particularly during the lean seasons. All these have resulted in mass poverty and deprivation from a minimum standard of living.

(ii) Unemployment and Under-employment:

A large number of people in the rural areas are landless. They do not find any avenue to engage themselves during the year. These landless labourers and marginal farmers remain unemployed as agriculture has become overcrowded. During the slack seasons these people sit idle and are unemployed and under-employed.
(iii) Inequality of Wealth and Income:
Inequality in the distribution of land has also led to inequality of wealth and income. According to a survey by R.B.I., 1981- 82, about 8 percent of rural households have assets more than Rs. 1 lakh each sharing 46 percent values of total assets. On the other hand, 39 percent of rural households had total assets less then Rs. 10,000/- each sharing only 5 percent value of total assets. By the end of the 7th plan 12 percent of rural people are landless and 66 percent of them are marginal farmers having less than 2.47 acres of land. As the distribution of land is unequal, the income that flows from the land also concentrates in the hands of a few big farmers,

(iv) Adverse effect on development:

The landless and marginal farmers own physical labour. If land will be provided to them they will cultivate with much interest and great vigor. This would have helped in increasing agricultural productivity and accelerating the pace of economic development. The big farmers only leased out the land without taking any care. This had affected the development of agriculture and development of the economy at large.
(v) Growth of capitalist Farming:
Big farmers were able to invest more for using modern inputs like HYV seeds, chemical fertilizer, pesticides and insecticides. The productivity in their field became high and they earned a surplus and made a huge profit. This helped in the growth of capitalist farming in the Indian economy.


The Government of India believed there was a heightened public concern on land acquisition issues in India. Of particular concern was that despite many amendments, over the years, to India's Land Acquisition Act of 1894, there was an absence of a cohesive national law that addressed fair compensation when private land is acquired for public use, and fair rehabilitation of land owners and those directly affected from loss of livelihoods. The Government of India believed s that a combined law was necessary, one that legally requires rehabilitation and resettlement necessarily and simultaneously follow government acquisition of land for public purposes.^[7]
Forty-Fourth Amendment Act of 1978 omitted Art 19(1) (f) with the net result being:-

1. The right not to be deprived of one’s property save by authority of law has since been no longer a fundamental right. Thus, if government issues a fiat to take away the property of a person, that person has no right to move the Supreme Court under Art 32.
2. Moreover, no one can challenge the reasonableness of the restriction imposed by any law the legislature made to deprive the person of his property.

The Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill, 2011 was introduced in Lok Sabha. Two Bills on similar lines were introduced in Lok Sabha in 2007. These Bills lapsed with the dissolution of the 14th Lok Sabha.[
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_to_Fair_Compensation_and_Transparency_in_Land_Acquisition,_Rehabilitation_and_Resettlement_Act,_2013