Implement land reforms to protect sharecroppers’ rights

Land reform is widely discussed and practiced throughout the world for fair and equitable distribution of agricultural lands, protect rights of landless sharecropper and increase productivity. Land reforms represent policies with significant promise to reduce rural poverty in developing countries. These reforms include land redistribution, titling programs and regulation of tenancy contracts.

The proposed land reform act 2014 circulated for public opinion by the Bangladesh government. It proposed the limit of ownership of agricultural lands upto 60 bighas (sec 4) and none will be allowed to buy 'benami' property (sec 5). It has provision of restriction on eviction from household (sec 7) and distribution of khash land for landless poor persons (sec 7).

The most important part of the proposed law is the Borga or crop sharing by landowner and farmer.
The proposed law has some provisions of (8, 1), Subject to the other provisions of this Ordinance, no person shall allow another person to cultivate his land and no person shall cultivate the land of another person on condition of sharing the produce of such land between them unless they execute a contract for such cultivation in such form and manner as may be prescribed. (8, 2) A borga contract shall be valid for a period of five years commencing from such date as may be specified in the borga contract.

Bangladesh has similar Land Reform Ordinance, 1984 but without any positive outcome during last 32 years in real reform particularly in borga contract.  We may evaluate the weakness and past experiences before the proposed land reform act 2014.
Bangladesh can take experience of global land reform.  Indian West Bengal (WB) government successfully passed law and implemented such reform in crop sharing since 1977.  The then Left Front government amended the Land Reforms Act (LRA), making sharecropping hereditary not valid for certain period like Bangladesh has 5 years.

LRA rendered eviction by landlords a punishable offense, and shifted the onus of proof concerning identity of the actual tiller on the landlord.The LRA is the key piece of legislation addressing land reform and land rights in West Bengal. The LRA covers a range of landrelated topics, but most significantly it: (1) defines the rights and obligations of landowners and borgadars; (2) prohibits fixed-rent leasing of land; (3) places a ceiling on the size of landholdings; (4) defines how land taken by the government should be distributed; and (5) limits the transferability of much of the land obtained through redistribution and also land held by Scheduled Tribe members.

Registration of Borga agreement gave sharecroppers permanent, hereditary tenancy rights, and limited the share of the crop payable as rent to landlords to 25 percent.The sharecropper will lose his right to the land only if the landlord wants to use the land for personal cultivation. These rights are inheritable but not transferable.  The share that the landlord can demand from a registered tenant will be no greater than 25 percent. The reform framed so that landlord can not threaten to replace him with another tenant if he refused to accept a lower share.

In addition to redistributing some agricultural land in ownership and protecting borgadars, West Bengal has also transferred ownership of homestead land to landless agricultural labourers, borgadarsand artisans.

Bangladesh law is mandatory for both landowner and sharecropper but there is no initiative from government to implement the law. The WB government had initiated a mass mobilization drive with the assistance of farmer unions (Kisan Sabha) and newly empowered local governments to identify sharecropping tenants and induce them to register their contracts with the local Land Records office. Registration was also accompanied by a floor on the share accruing to tenants, amounting to 75% (replaced by 50% if the landlord pays cost of all non-labor inputs).

These land reforms were complemented with creation of a three tier system of panchayats or elected local governments -one of those, Gram Panchayats (GPs)), who were delegated responsibility for delivery of various input supply services and local infrastructure.

The principal responsibilities entrusted to the panchayats included implementation of land reforms, of the two principal poverty alleviation schemes (the Integrated Rural Development Program which gave subsidized credit to the poor, and employment programs such as Food for Work (FFW), National Rural Employment Program (NREP), Rural Labour Employment Guarantee Program (RLEGP) in the 1980s which were merged into the Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY) from 1989 onwards), distribution of subsidized agricultural inputs (in the form of minikits containing seeds, fertilizers and pesticides), local infrastructure projects (including roads and irrigation), and miscellaneous welfare schemes (old-age assistance, disaster relief, housing programs for the poor etc.).

The bulk of the funds for these programs were devolved to the local governments under various schemes sponsored by the Indian central and state government. The funds percolated down from the central government to GPs through the state government, its district-wide allocations, and then down through the upper tiers of the panchayats at the block and district levels. Upper tiers of the panchayats thus affected allocation across different GPs, while the main role of the GP was to select beneficiaries of these schemes within their jurisdiction.

LRA has given priority right of purchase to the borgadars. The first option would be a purchase option under which the borgadarcould assume ownership over the entire borgaholding by paying the landownera government-determined sum of perhaps 50 percent (or 60 percent) of the land'smarket value. The second option would be an exchange option under which the borgadar could unilaterally choose to assume ownership over 50 percent of the borgaholding by giving up his borgadarrights over the remainingportion of the land. This part would then revert in unencumbered ownership to the landlord who could either sell or personally cultivate the land subject to otherexisting restrictions.

The records revealed that many borgadarsand landlords are making or have made deals which resulted in the borgadarreceiving ownership of a portion of the borgaland (ranging from 25 percent to 60 percent of the land) in return for giving up protected borgadarrights on the remaining land.

West Bengal has also taken determined steps to bolster the position of borgadars by regulating the borgadar-landlord relationship through a program called "Operation Borga". The main components of this regulation consist of tenure security protection for borgadarsand control over the share amount paid to landlords by borgadars. Implementation of theseprotections has been made possible largely through the determined recording of existing borgadarsthroughout the state.

Operation Borga, a program designed to implement and enforce thelong-dormant agricultural tenancy laws that regulated rents and securityof tenure of sharecroppers.

Bangladesh law proposed for share-crop agreement valid for 5 years while the WB law ensured for unlimited period unless bread by sharecropper or land owner decided to cultivate themselves. WB government did not rely on wish of owner-sharecroppers initiative to register the share agreement with relevant authority. WB has given responsibility of registration to the local government. They made the program successful with the active involvement of local government and creating a social movement.

The "Operation Bogra" program is a success story just cross the border.Let us take the experience of WB and revised the law and ensure people's participation in the implantation of the reform to protect the interest of poor farmers over sharecrops and right to purchase the land from existing white collar farmers or landowners for optimum use of very limited agricultural land of the tiny land with huge population.

The writer is a Non-Government Adviser, Bangladesh Competition Commission