The BJP-led West Bengal government aims to overhaul its industrial policy by prioritising direct land purchase over compulsory acquisition, seeking to attract investment while maintaining public trust amidst the shadow of past protests.
West Bengal’s new Bharatiya Janata Party government is moving to redraw its industrial policy, with land acquisition emerging again as the most politically sensitive issue in the state’s efforts to attract investment. At a three-hour meeting at Nabanna with leading industrialists and the state’s ministerial panel on industry, the question of how land should be secured for factories and other projects dominated the discussion, reflecting the continuing shadow of the Singur and Nandigram protests that reshaped Bengal’s politics.
According to The Indian Express, Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari signalled last month that his administration would prefer direct land purchase over compulsory acquisition for industrial projects. The approach is designed to avoid the kind of confrontation that defined previous land battles while giving investors greater certainty. The government has also said it wants a single-window clearance system for proposals worth more than Rs 100 crore, in an effort to speed up approvals and make the state more competitive.
The industrial push forms part of a broader attempt by Adhikari to reposition West Bengal as investment-friendly after years in which land disputes were seen as a brake on growth. In June, he said he wanted to bring the Tata Group back to the state and tied that ambition to a more employment-focused policy that would rely on transparency and public consent. The latest discussions suggest the administration is trying to balance that pitch to industry with an explicit promise not to trample on local trust.
Commerce and Industries Minister Tapas Roy said after Tuesday’s meeting that the government would not take any step that harms industry or betrays the confidence of the public. “The government has assured that all measures will be taken with complete transparency and a positive outlook,” Roy said. That language points to the political tightrope facing the new government: it wants to accelerate industrialisation, but it also knows that in Bengal, land policy is never just an economic question.
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