A 24-member delegation of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) led by party president Shibu Soren met President Ram Nath Kovind at Rashtrpati Bhawan on Tuesday and handed over a letter requesting him not to give nod to amendments to the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (also called land Acquisition Act, 2013) and Religious Freedom Bill 2017 recently passed by the Jharkhand Assembly.
JMM general secretary Vinod Pandey said that the Party’s working president Hemant Soren explained his points before the President who assured that he will take decision over the bill as per the provisions of the Constitution.
“The President told us that since it was a serious matter, he will take a decision after taking each and every aspect of it into consideration as per the provisions of the Constitution,” said Pandey.
The amendments, according to Pandey, came after the earlier proposed amendments to the Chhotanagpur Tenancy (CNT) Act and Santhal Pargana Tenancy (SPT) Act had to be withdrawn amid tremendous opposition. The bills were returned to the Government by the
Governor eight months after they were passed late last year.
The letter written by the JMM chief stated that the objective of the bill was purely for the purpose of open loot of the state’s land by forcefully acquiring them and put the state in the fire of displacement in the name of development, employment generation and bringing in industries there.
“It was highly objectionable that the bill mentioned that it was deemed to be coming into being from January 1, 2014. How could they assume it to be passed from the past,” stated the letter.
The letter also stated that by making changes in Section 2 (2) in the said Act, essentiality of Social Impact Assessment (SIA) had been waived off which was the soul of the original bill.
“The bill passed in Jharkhand Assembly will have destructive impact on the Adivasi – Moolwasi population,” the JMM added.
The delegation also tried to bring into notice the recently passed Religious Freedom Bill 2017 passed by Jharkhand Assembly and said that it will pose a big threat to the social and communal harmony in the State. They said that despite the fact that the Constitution of India provides freedom of practising a religion of his or her choice, Religious Freedom Bill 2017 passed in Jharkhand Assembly may give rise to a sense of natural fear in the minds of people, especially minorities, who might get tortured in the name of it.