The mission housing for all can’t be realised without homestead land for the poor. The State has to resolve historic homestead land issues and must develop new habitations with basic amenities.
Homestead landlessness is the core problem to avail housing schemes in rural areas. For last 70 years, there has been very slow implementation of laws to ensure land for housing. As a result, there are lakhs of homeless poor getting deprived of land to construct affordable house with support of the Government for a dignified living.
There are thousands of informal human settlements inside forest areas , river and canal banks , sea coasts, city and village outskirts , roadsides , mining dumping yards periphery of industrial areas, cocoanut and mangrove forest areas, besides emerging slums in urban areas of the State where people have been living for past so many years in most distressed condition without a scope of affordable housing due to lack of homestead land rights.
This subhuman condition of people has not substantially drawn the attention of the authorities. The poor living conditions of a large number of people in temporary shelters without basic amenities are the breeding grounds of diseases and poor health and mental condition. It has impact over the working population and growth.
The Dalits, Adivasies, and minorities continue to suffer with social disabilities. They are forced to live in segregation because of caste and religion based discrimination. Their demand for rights over the land they are occupying since generations falls in deaf ears.
land being a State subject, it was expected that the Revenue Department would guarantee minimum homestead land for each and every household through survey and settlement and also by developing new habitation areas with facilities for basic amenities.
But even today in spite of provisions under law, nowhere the Tehsil officials are proactively visiting the villages or hamlets to settle the homestead less household and help them to become eligible beneficiaries of housing schemes.
lakhs of landless poor beneficiaries submitting applications for homestead land are routinely visiting offices and demanding claims but unfortunately the action by local revenue officials are far from satisfactory. There have been a number of ways for distribution of land among the landless poor in the absence of non-availability of Government land, but thanks to bureaucratic apathy and inordinate delay process, it is not done for the landless poor. The harassment and distress condition of the poor relating to land and housing remains unaddressed by political parties and social movements.
It is reported that land patta is distributed to landless poor in forest and hilly areas which are not fit for habitation due to lack of basic minimum amenities. These allotted plots are also located in a distance of five to ten kilometers from the village without communication. In some places, there is instance of strong opposition by local influential people who are not allowing the poor and marginalized section to settle there.
Many of the families having patta are struggling to occupy the land because of the threat by the dominant people in the locality and even in many places the land is already occupied by influential people.
The Government has not developed new habitations with all facilities to settle the landless people there, rather the poor people are forced to accommodate anywhere without basic amenities and protection by local administration.
There are also houses constructed on Government land without record of rights of the land by the beneficiaries owning the house for so many years.
Virtually, the block and Tehsil offices have no coordination in matter of homestead land and housing projects for the landless poor and no departmental review take place to ensure land and house for the prospective beneficiaries. There is lack of awareness among rural illiterate about the process of homestead land distribution schemes. The patta distribution is being observed as ceremonies with involvement of Ministers, MPs and MlAs as guest who are using the events for their political propaganda but not to serve the purpose.
The Government of Odisha engaged in homestead land distribution of maximum 10 decimal of land since 1974-75 under the provision of land settlement Act 1962 and subsequent rules and later through a scheme named Vasundhara since 2007. Almost 45 years have passed but the target remains unfinished. During the years, the number of landless households has increased with dividing of families.
A large number of landless rural poor migrate to cities and many families become migrant workers outside the State.
In last 70 years, projects like dams, mining, industry, railways, national highways, ports, other infrastructural projects and deforestation, loss of forest and agriculture based livelihoods have displaced lakhs of families who become further homeless without land and proper rehabilitation.
The continued natural calamities every year have been adding burden to the further impoverishment of the landlessness and homelessness of the poor.
The Government land policy is in support of allocation of huge land to the private companies on the plea of development. There is no assessment and monitoring body to see the proper use of the allocated land and their recovery in case of misuse. It is a fact that most of the companies have occupied more land beyond their requirement and many of them even violate the purpose of utilization. The state Government has reserved land for mining and other projects by denying land and housing rights of the people.
The historical limitations in the land revenue administration created by different rulers such as Hindu, Mogul, Maratha and British have diluted the process of emerging a comprehensive land rights provisions for all regions and citizens from diverse social and economic classes. Our village social structure and land ownership have not fundamentally changed to the desired extent.
This ongoing unequal practices need to be changed with rule of law for paving way for a more inclusive settlement of land.
The Government of Odisha needs to learn from the experience of States such as Kerla, AP and Telengana, TN, HP, Jammu and Kashmir who have well managed the homestead land rights of its people and used the advantage of land and housing schemes.
The National Rural Homestead land Rights Bill 2013 was planned to serve this purpose but it was not approved by the Parliament. There is a need for a national law for right to homestead land and right to adequate housing for all.
(manasbbsr15@gmial.com)