The unlikely accomplices
The investigation by the committee revealed several surprises, one of which is that in a few cases, even the state governments approved of these companies' tactics. Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, for instance, liberalised their land ceiling acts in the mid-90s to attract plantation companies. The Madhya Pradesh land ceiling amendments now allow these companies to hold private land up to 100 acres of which 80 per cent can be irrigated for plantation purposes. Compared to this, the 1972 Land Ceiling Act allowed an individual to own only 18 acres of irrigated land or up to 56 acres of non-irrigated lands. Companies such as Kitply have already acquired 40 acres of land in Raipur district for its Sal plantations. Karnataka, meanwhile, had liberalised its land ceiling to around 200 acres, a step that had irked the state's social activists and environmentalists.