Spiralling compensation demands irk govt

KATHMANDU, AUG 22 -

A team from the Ministry of Commerce and Supplies (MoCS), which visited a proposed site for dry port in Rasuwa two months ago to assess land price for acquisition, was in for a big surprise when they were confronted with a soaring price of land at the site.

“Two years ago, when the spot was identified as one of the project site, compensation locals demanded was just Rs 100,000 for a ropani of land,” said Lalmani Joshi, Secretary of MoCS. “Now, they have started to demand from Rs 500,000 to Rs 700,000 for a ropani.” Joshi said that the government has since decided against constructing the dry port in that location.

It is not the isolated case related to compensation in development projects. The government had to purchase land in Larcha, Sindhupalchow to build dry port at expensive rate than compensation locals previously sought.

Initially, the locals demanded compensation at the rate of Rs 75,000 per ropani of land but the government had to pay Rs 250,000 per ropani while acquiring 214 ropanies of land there. “We had to pay Rs 9 million per ropani to acquire three ropanies land on the other side of the nearby Bhotekoshi river later,” said Joshi.

China is constructing the dry port there as per the agreement between two countries. Following the completion of work, current customs office in Tatopani will be transferred to Larcha and Chinese trucks carrying goods will arrive directly to the dry port.

Apart from the dry port, the Kathmandu-Nijgadh Fast-Track project is also facing the compensation trouble particularly in Khokana village at outskirt of Kathmandu valley.

 Despite paying compensation to acquire land in most of other parts of the country for the Fast-Track project, the government has not been able to manage enough resources to compensate locals of Khokana due to increased price of land.

Initially, the price of land in Khokana soared due to the proposed Outer Ring Road that would go through the village. “With the fast track also crossing the same place, the land price soared further there,” said Dinesh Prakash Basnet, former project chief of the Fast-Track project, who recently retired from the government service.

The government officials said that carrying out major development activities is becoming increasingly difficult due to hefty compensation demands once people get the whiff of a project coming to that particular area. An official at the Department of Land Reforms and Management said that demands for compensation depend upon the financer of the project. Involvement of donors like the World Bank and Asian Development Bank would lead to higher demand for compensation.

“If the central government is involved in carrying out the project, demand lowers a little and it further goes now in the case local government is carrying out development project,” said the official.

Joshi said that the right after finding out that certain project is being implemented in certain place, the land mafias would reach there and hike the price of land. In a bid to tackle the problem, the government has formed a committee headed by the member secretary of the National Planning Commission to recommend on uniform policy and standard for acquiring land and improving the current Land Acquisition Act.

As per the direction of Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai, during the meeting of National Development Problem Solution Committee on June 13, 2012, the committee was formed with secretaries of ministries including home, land reforms, energy, irrigation, local development, physical planning and finances and representative of Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry. The committee also formed technical sub-committee headed by Krishna Bahadur Raut, joint secretary at the Ministry of Land Reforms and Management to study and prepare report to the committee.

“We will suggest a uniform policy and standard for acquiring land for all types of development projects as determining reasonable compensation is becoming tough due to different Acts and policies fixing different standards for land acquisition,” said Rohit Kumar Bhattarai, member secretary of technical committee.



Source: The Kathmandu Post