Customary Rights of Farmers in Neoliberal India: A Legal and Policy Analysis

The objective of this work is to understand the evolutionary process of economic and legal policies that brought international regime of private property rights over the common property resources, especially seeds and plant varieties. Unbalanced model of development would increase disparity in income and impact agricultural infrastructure development and environment sustainability. Though materialization of farmers' rights was fulfilled by a compromise arrived at between NGOs and Industry together, there are several grey areas both at the conceptual and the procedural levels that subordinate rights of farmers in reality. This monograph analyzes the impact of legal policy reforms during 'second green revolution' phase on farmers' customary rights and livelihood, particularly in the context of the extension of private property rights to plant varieties and seeds and migration of cultivators to the cities.

Sophy K. Joseph is Assistant Professor at National Law University Delhi.