Bhoodān-based Land Acquisition (BhaLĀi): Creating Stakeholder Bhalai, Spiritually

Abstract

Land acquisition for commercial purposes in India is mainly a top-down approach that employs instrumental means like fair market valuations. Market forces play a major role in the land transfer process. On many instances, these have led to sustainability challenges, poor stakeholder management, sustainability challenges and subpar business performance. Land since time immemorial has spiritual bearings in India. There have been numerous occasions in the past when land-related sustainability challenges were resolved through spiritual means—most notably the Bhoodān movement. This article is an attempt to offer a bottom-up and socioculturally aligned spiritual means to facilitate land acquisition based on voluntary land transfers. In particular, we conceptualize Bhoodān-based land acquisition (BhaLĀi) which can facilitate voluntary land transfer, creating stakeholder bhalai (well-being in Hindi), spiritually. Implications for research and practice in this regard have been discussed.