<div>As expected, the BJP has decided to buy time, and the BJP’s S S Ahluwalia-led joint parliamentary committee on land bill will now submit its “consensus report” on the contentious land bill only in the winter session of Parliament. The crucial Bihar elections would be over by then.</div><div> </div><div>In the last meeting of the joint committee, the BJP members had agreed to bring back the consent clause, and social impact clause in the bill, making it look more like the Congress’s 2013 Land Act.</div><div> </div><div>In its meeting on Monday, the Congress and TMC sought more time to study certain clauses, following which they were accused of indulging in “delaying tactics”.</div><div> </div><div>The committee was initially supposed to submit its report by Aug 11.</div><div> </div><div>Monday’s meeting was expected to evolve consensus on three key provisions of returning unutilized land to owners after five years, the retrospective clause, and the “money deposited in a an account is money deposited with the farmer” clause.</div><div> </div><div>The meeting however could only take up the retrospective clause during which the Congress members opposed any changes in provision of 24 (2) of the UPA Act.</div>
