Government may take the land pooling route for expressway and bypass projects

News:

• The government proposes to return a substantial proportion of developed land along proposed expressways and city bypass projects to owners for commercial development.
• The move will help acquire space to build roads, offering a possible way out for a seemingly intractable obstacle in the way of all infrastructure development in India.
• India is looking to lay 30 kilometres of roads everyday by March next year, more than double 14 km now.
• The model is already being used in Andhra Pradesh for development of its capital.
• “Land pooling is now a proven mechanism for executing public projects that require large amounts of land and where the projects lead to significant increase in the land value,” said Jaijit Bhattacharya, partner, infrastructure, KPMG.
• Once the land ordinance lapses, the land acquisition bill 2013 will come into force and with conditions of that bill, acquisition of land will be a long-drawn process leading to stalling the development of the sector,” a senior government official said.

Source: ET