Homestead tenancy. Broadly speaking, homesteads under two categories organizationally. . In most parts of India, the village system with conglomerated housing of all the people of the village exists. In some areas, specially on the western coast and in the eastern parts of India, houses are often built on the cultivated land and people live scattered.
Homestead-tenancy problems arise mostly in the case of the latter type. Protection against eviction of a homestead tenant has been a basic provision in most of the tenancy laws, with the right of pre-emption given to the homestead-dweller in case the land-owner wants to sell the land. The legislative provisions in the Vidarbha and Marathwada regions of Maharashtra and in the Kutch area of Gujarat are on these lines. Some states have gone a step further and have provided for the optional right to purchase the house sites by the homestead-dwellers. The Karnataka Land Reforms Act and the Kerala Land Reforms Act are examples. The West Bengal Acquisition and Settlement of homestead Land Act also provides the homestead-dwellers with the optional right to purchase homesteads. In the states of Bihar, Gujarat, Jammu and Kashmir, Tamil Nadu, Orissa and in Pondicherry and Dadra and Nagar Haveli the law provides for thw outright ownership to the homestead -dwellers, providing them with the status of tenants and this is indistinguishable from ownership rights. Andhra Pradesh has recently promulgated an ordinance conferring ownership to homestead dwellers. This was later replaced by an Act. Though homesteads are largely in the abadi adequate protection to individual owners has been given in the laws of Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Saurashtra area of Gujarat.
Bhoomdan and Gramdan Acts. The Bhoomdan Movement started in the early 1960s spread all over the country as a movement to collect the donations of land for distribution among the landless. Acharya, Vinobha Bhave initiated this movement to meet the challenge posed by the requirements of the landless people through the willing cooperation of the rich land-owners in the true Gandhian spirit. For the collection of land that was donated and for distribution among the eligible categories of persons, the movement had to get legislative sanction and approval of the State and a series of legislative measures followed on the principles laid down in the movement. Most of the states have enacted legislation and framed necessary rules to facilitate the movement.
Often, committees are set up for acquiring holdings, administering and transferring property, both movable and immovable, and for entering into contracts. The land vested in the Committee is not liable to be attached or to be bold in the execution of a decree or order of a civil court. Bhoomdan lands held by the committees are exempted from the ceiling laws. Over 18,00,000 hectares of land was collected in Bhoomdan in various states, but a major part of the land, so collected, remains undistributed owing to reasons, including legal difficulties, poor quality of the land, etc.
LAND MANAGEMENT
While the land-reform measures, such as the abolition of the intermediaries, the regulation of tenancy relationship and the ceiling on holdings attempt to rationalize the agrarian structure and the land-man relationship, a dynamic approach towards the reorganization of agricultural operations is essential for agricultural progress. A number of legislative measures have been taken to facilitate proper land use and land management. The consolidation of holdings is probably one of the major steps in this direction. The Jammu and Kashniir land Act has since been suspended pending revision thereof. Consolidation of holding. Owing to various socioeconomic factors that have operated over a long period, agricultural holdings in the country have become greatly fragmented and dispersed, with the result that an average farmer has to spend much time and resources without realizing even the economy obtainable from a small holding.
The fragmentation of a holding aggravates the already-acute problem of small holdings in the country. The consolidation of holdings offers a solution to the problem of fragmentation by regrouping the scattered plots within a holding into a minimum number of blocks. Originally the consolidation of holdings was tried on a voluntary basis with legislative backing. These earlier measures were started as early as the 1920s. But as the consolidation made slow progress under voluntary participation by the land-holders, it was thought necessary that some element of compulsion should be employed.
Recent legislative measures on the consolidation of holdings rely on some degree of compulsion, as can be seen in the Bombay Prevention of Fragmentation and Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1948, the Punjab Holdings (Consolidation and prevention of Fragmentation) Act, 1949 and in the U.P. Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1953. Under these Acts, a state government declares by a notification its intention to make a scheme for the consolidation of holdings in a specified village or villages or parts thereof. The scheme prepared by a consolidation officer is modified. If necessary, in the light of the objections received. After finalization, the scheme is published by the Governor, and the action to consolidate land is taken thereafter. Once the land is consolidated, it cannot be partitioned without the permission of the Collector. The consolidation laws, besides providing for the consolidation of small and scattered holdings, foster an overall rational management of land in a village by making suitable allocations for social requirements. The Uttar Pradesh Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1963, the Rajasthan Holdings (Consolidation and prevention of Fragmentation) Act, 1954, the Madhya Pradesh Land Revenue Code, 1959, the Jammu and Kashmir Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1960, the Bihar Consolidation Holdings and Prevention of Fragmentation Act, 1966, the Assam Consolidation of Holdings Act, 1960, the Andhra Pradesh Prevention of Fragmentation and Consolidation Act , the Himachal Pradesh Consolidation of Holdings Act are some of the main legislative measures that have gone into the statute book. Upto the end of 1973-74 the total area of 35,622 thousand hectares has been consolidated. This work has been practically completed in Punjab and Haryana and is expected to be completed in UP in the Fifth Plan.
The first attempt to prevent further fragmentation was made in Maharashtra in 1947. The Bombay Prevention of Fragmentation and Consolidation of Holdings Act authorized the government to fix the area that could be profitably cultivated in a seperate block called 'standard area' and any piece of land below this is called a fragment. The transfer or partition of land which will result in fragmentation is prohibited. Similiar legislative measures for prevention of fragmentation is prohobited. Similar measures have been enacted in Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Karnataka, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, and the union territory of Delhi. The legislation has not been in force in some of the states.
