In a first of its kind initiative, the Gujarat Government has made a provision for farmers to have equity participation in an industrial venture to be set on their agriculture land.
For this purpose, modification in the rules pertaining to land Tenancy Act has been done to give option of equity participation to farmers whose land would be purchased by industries. The equity participation would be possible in the venture against the price of the land, said an official in the State Revenue Department. According to him, the other modification in the rules gives option to developers of industrial park on agriculture land to sell the land to individual entrepreneurs for setting up industries and an extension of time limit from five to seven years to start production in the manufacturing units set up on land purchased from farmers.
In case the industrialist is unable to start manufacturing even after seven years, the State Government would allow entrepreneurs who wished to start industry to sell the agriculture land purchased from farmers on payment of up to 100 per cent of the land revenue.