Jharkhand: Tribal Law Blocks Land Acquisition in One Village, Other Falters

Ranchi, Jharkhand: “We grew suspicious as we saw unknown faces with JCBs in our fields. We questioned them and learnt that the government has allocated our 62.26 acres to Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust for establishing a research centre. My father and the then gram pradhan [village head], Bandhu Munda, along with locals protested, asking how anyone can build anything on our zameen [land],” said Etwa Munda (34) of Dami village in Bundu panchayat, recalling the 2007 incident.  

This gairmajaura khas land was where 150 to 200 families grazed their cattle, so they did not budge when the MLA and officials came to hold discussions. “The officials told us to take our animals to Taimara hills, but that is five km from Dami. How would our animals go that far? The land given to Patanjali is only half-a-km away,” Etwa went on.  

Moreover, people worshipped village deities and collected firewood from the land, which hosted medicinal plants such as karanj, siduaar, neem, rori and kusum. Tribals of Chotanagupur region have been using them for centuries. “So we dismissed their offer and chased them away,” he added.  

As per the reply to a Right to Information (RTI) application filed in 2021 by Sunil Kumar Mahto, an RTI activist and advocate at Jharkhand High Court, two kinds of land were allocated in the name of Patanjali in Ranchi district. It said that on March 29, 2006, the Cabinet of Jharkhand allocated 62.26 acres for establishing the Centre for Research and Cultivation of Medicinal and Aromatic Plant in Bundu panchayat and another 15 acres in Bargawan panchayat to build an ayurveda college. In both cases, the token amount for transfer was Rs 101 and the lease period was 30 years.  

Unlike in Bundu where protests scrapped the project, Bargawan saw activities of a different kind. When locals learnt about the ayurveda college proposal, they readily agreed by holding a gram sabha meeting in the presence of the then gram pradhan Dema Tirki, who told them that they would be employed in the facility.  

“Patanjali wanted to build an ayurvedic facility where its products would be manufactured. We agreed to provide land as this was in favour of the community. The locals would be employed in both manufacturing and sales. However, we were clueless that they would build a school instead,” Sushma Hemron, a panchayat samiti member and former ward member of Bargawan, told 101Reporters.

Acharyakulam, an educational institution for schoolchildren, was built in 2013. However, according to Hemron, the locals cannot afford to send their children there. Echoing her, Krishna Gop, a businessman and Bargawan resident, said, “A child from my family studies in class 5 at Acharyakulam. His admission fee was around Rs 50,000, excluding quarterly fees, bus fare, library fees, and curricular activities.”

Despite the breach of trust, the villagers did not launch a protest when things went awry. Moreover, they had nothing to show as a document as there was no official agreement between the villagers and Patanjali. In those days, the village head and communities managed their affairs through an informal, locally organised system of governance. The decision was made much before the establishment of the panchayat system in the state in 2010. 

“I became a ward member after the first panchayat elections in 2010. In 2014, I visited the school in my capacity as a gram sabha member and requested the authorities to employ locals as per their skills as this school stood on tribal land. But they said they do not acknowledge representatives of the gram sabha,” Hemron informed.

“What is the point of contesting these elections,” she asked disappointingly. 

Landing in trouble

Not just in Bargawan or Bundu, common lands are facing significant challenges these days, affecting the livelihood of the communities dependent on it directly or indirectly. When Bargawan residents decided to lease out land to Patanjali, little did they know that it was a smooth way of converting their common land into revenue land.

The land on which Acharyakulam was built is gairmajarua aam, which means uncultivated common land whose ownership lies with the government.

Elaborating on this, Anmol Gupta, an independent legal researcher, told 101Reporters that usually pastoral/community land is recorded as government land in revenue records. “So if the government takes them over for any other purpose, communities will usually not be able to approach court because there is no technical violation of the law." 

On the other hand, the land in Bundu eyed by Patanjali was of gairmajaura khas type. As per Section 3 of the Bihar Land Reforms Act, 1950, gairmajaura khas lands are vested with the state. However, the gairmajaura khas land in Bundu panchayat falls under the Mundari Khuntkatti system (original settlers of land among the Mundas) protected by the Chota Nagpur Tenancy (CNT) Act, 1908, which exempts it from the provisions of the Land Reforms Act. Although the Act has reduced the Khuntkattidars to tenants, the power to manage the land is still with the traditional tribal institutions and village councils.

"In the Mundari Khuntkatti system, the pradhan collects revenue and the state has no right to such lands. The CNT Act strictly prohibits any kind of land allocation or transfer to non-Mundas. Yet, in this case, the Cabinet allocated 62.26 acres to Patanjali," added Advocate Mahto.

However, locals in Bundu were able to exercise their rights because the CNT Act protected their ownership. Like this law, there are other legislations that protect the customary rights on public lands in Jharkhand, such as the Santhal Parganas Tenancy Act, 1949, the Forest Right Act, 2006, the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996, and the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013.

This is the entrance view of the Acharyakulam building (Photo - Nisha Kumari, 101Reporters).

Murky deals?

The management of lands, especially common lands, falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Revenue, Registration and Land Reforms. When the state allocates public land to a private company, the aim is to stimulate economic development through infrastructure projects, often with an expectation to receive benefits such as tax revenue, job opportunities and improved public services. In case of violations of the terms and conditions, the department reserves the right to take disciplinary action against the lessee. 

Strangely, the lease agreement executed on April 27, 2006, between the Governor of Jharkhand, represented by the then Deputy Commissioner of Ranchi, Pradeep Kumar, and Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust general secretary Acharya Balkrishna does not mention the word ‘Acharyakulam’ or ‘school’, which violates lease terms.

“This indicates that the school is built to earn a profit, where there is no concession for the people of Jharkhand.  The contract includes a reversion clause that says that the government reserves the right to terminate the lease agreement and repossess the land if the land undertaken for a particular purpose is not used for that purpose,” Adv Mahto stated.

The reversion clause was also mentioned in the lease agreement. However, the Department of Revenue, Registration and Land Reforms did not respond to the questions in this regard.

In Bundu, the land records (as per register 2) mention the Centre for Research and Cultivation of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust, as the raiyats, which is lawfully incorrect. However, the department did not comment on this as well.

Though 101Reporters approached Acharyakulam school administration to clarify their position on the questions raised, they kept dodging the issue even after expressing willingness to speak and after giving dates for an interview.

Suggested measures

Land is a controversial subject and is central to the majority of conflicts in Jharkhand. A 2016 study by the Rights and Resources Initiative and Tata Institute of Social Sciences states that three-quarters of the land-related conflicts involved common lands, either forest or non-forest.

There is a steady decline in gairmajaura lands in Jharkhand because of unattended encroachment as per a report titled Land Governance Assessment Framework, Jharkhand, from the National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi. It further states that little regard has been paid for the protection, development and reinvigoration of such lands. The report also suggested that the implementation of the Bihar Public Land Encroachment Act, 1961, would be helpful in surveying town common lands in headquarters and later fencing them to identify and protect them from further encroachment. 

The last documented assessment of India’s common lands happened in 1998. An updated national land database would help the government to facilitate informed management and decision-making. Also, land conflicts can be avoided if ownership details based on gender and community are available. The information on community lands should be made public.

The Central government has set up land banks in the past by including details of common lands and unused lands of various state departments. Land bank as a concept was introduced under the leadership of the then Chief Minister of Jharkhand, Raghubar Das, in 2016, which gave the government absolute power to acquire, manage and repurpose vacant, abandoned or foreclosed properties.  

Commenting on this, Sudhir Pal, founder and managing trustee, Manthan Yuva Sansthan, said, “Land bank is central to the political discourse in Jharkhand. Frequent attempts are being made by the state government to bring common lands [like the protected one in Bundu] under the land banks. But communities here have always opposed this concept because common lands like sarna and masna carry deep religious values, and we have seen many instances where tribal lands have been transferred to non-tribals.” 

Encroachments of common lands as seen in Bargawan and Bundu are often legalised by the local institutions themselves. Therefore, for better management of common assets, a land database should include the historical and customary uses of lands and measures to build boundaries to prevent further privatisation. Also, provisions for non-land owners should be included to give the locals power to manage their community lands. 

Article 39(b) of the Constitution of India states that the “ownership and control of the material resources of the community” should be distributed “to sub-serve the common good”. Even if the state has absolute ownership of such lands, the commons draw strength from the Public Trust Doctrine that protects certain components of natural resources from exploitation. Although these are held by the state, it should be for the people, who are, in the real sense, the owners and the beneficiaries of the same.  

Nisha Kumari is a Jharkhand-based freelance journalist and a member of 101Reporters, a pan-India network of grassroots reporters.