Punjab Government has notified the Punjab land Reforms (Amendment) Act, 2017.
The amendments are aimed at promoting diversification of agriculture by also covering guava, banana and vineyard cultivation under the set of exemptions provided to orchard cultivators. Besides, the agriculture land, utilised for non-agricultural purposes, has also been kept out of the purview of this Act by making the required amendment.
“The Act covers two aspects. The first is an amendment in section 3(8) of Punjab land Reforms Act, 1972. The definition of an orchard under this section the Act didn't include land under guava, banana trees and vineyard as an orchard. In order to diversify the base of agricultural production of the State from monoculture of wheat and paddy towards fruits and vegetables, Punjab Government has made an amendment in this section 3(8) of the Act and henceforth, the definition of orchard would also cover the land under banana, guava trees or under vineyard in the definition of an orchard,” informed the State Financial Commissioner (Revenue) Vini Mahajan.
Mahajan said that this would encourage the production of these crops, thereby promoting diversification of agriculture.
It is pertinent to mention that presently, guava is second major fruit crop in the State after kinnow and occupies an area of 8103 hectares with an annual production of 182089 MT.
“With this amendment, guava, banana and vineyard cultivation will also be covered under the set of exemptions provided to orchard cultivators and will give a much needed boost to the Government's drive towards diversification of agriculture,” she said.
Mahajan said that the second amendment was made in section 27(j) of Punjab land Reforms Act, 1972, “to ensure that agriculture land which has been utilised for non-agricultural purposes like housing, industrial, infrastructure projects like SEZ, tourism units (hotels and resorts), public utilities, warehousing, commercial, cultural, recreational, sports, religious, institutional is kept out of the purview of this Act”.
“Provided that those acquiring agriculture land for such bonafide non-agricultural uses would be required to intimate such intention of change of land use for non-agricultural purposes to the Collector within one year from the date of publication of Punjab land Reforms (Amendment) Act, 2017, or within one year from the date of acquisition of such land and in such cases, the Collector, on receipt of such intimation, shall cause the necessary entries to be recorded in the revenue record,” she said.