What is the value of agricultural land in Punjab these days?

[weareallone]

How much per acre and where is the CHEAPEST agricultural/forest land in Punjab today (to buy for tree planting/nature protection project)?

General areas and ballpark prices will be helpful so that I can narrow the search.

Ps. If someone knows any non-selfish property dealer, please PM me their details 

 

 

[S1ngh]

1 hour ago, weareallone said:

How much per acre and where is the CHEAPEST agricultural/forest land in Punjab today (to buy for tree planting/nature protection project)?

General areas and ballpark prices will be helpful so that I can narrow the search.

Ps. If someone knows any non-selfish property dealer, please PM me their details 

Non-Indian residents cannot buy agriculture land. Property dealers of India are the worst. 
Best way is to team up with india based NGO/Non-profit org for environmental projects

[weareallone]

1 hour ago, S1ngh said:

Non-Indian residents cannot buy agriculture land. Property dealers of India are the worst. 
Best way is to team up with india based NGO/Non-profit org for environmental projects

I live in India now. In my experience the so called NGOs are the biggest chors! Followed by property agents. Hoping someone can give me an indication on the market in different areas. You can PM me if you don't want the secret info to "get out"

[LifeIsBeautiful]

Just go on magicbricks.

 

Hoshiarpur and the border areas are the cheapest.

[LifeIsBeautiful]

6 hours ago, weareallone said:

How much per acre and where is the CHEAPEST agricultural/forest land in Punjab today (to buy for tree planting/nature protection project)?

General areas and ballpark prices will be helpful so that I can narrow the search.

Ps. If someone knows any non-selfish property dealer, please PM me their details 

 

 

Hoshiarpur 4 lakh to 10 lakh

[weareallone]

4 hours ago, LifeIsBeautiful said:

Hoshiarpur 4 lakh to 10 lakh

Thanks for replying. It just so happens that Hoshiarpur is actually the only one area that I know about. There's a land mafia in Hoshiarpur. The whole forest area of the Shivlaik range (the cheap land) is occupied government land (illegal kabja). If you got political connections, you may be able to illegally buy it. The great grandson of kushwant Singh has 1200 acres there (he boasted to me as to how he obtained it illegally). It’s also unsafe. Some years ago, when scouting for land, I got confronted by an armed mob trying to Lynch me for straying into their village. I held them off long enough until the authorities arrived. I was warned never to step into the area again as there’s significant significant mafia presence there.

Any other parts of Punjab? Which border areas do you mean? Are there any proper forests and flowing streams left in the plains?

If someone were to ask me about the UK, I could give them a detailed summary on where to find what kind of land and at what price. Hobby farm? Woodland? Coast? Hills? Equestrian? River? Dark sky? A bit of all? I can get you sorted. Can a local  friend please help me likewise for the same in Punjab?

Magic bricks and the like are mostly fraud and speculative sales. It's not helpful for land research.

I lived in South India for some time and it's very professional there. I asked for river and waterfall at a low price and they took me to several beautiful sites. People were kind and polite and didn't discriminate (I'm a Bana wearing shastardari and don't speak their language).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[dallysingh101]

It seems like there's a culture of land-snatching amongst Panjabis. I might be wrong, and I'd like to hear alternative opinions, but I think anyone investing over there needs to grasp this. 

On top of the external forces, one highly educated guy I met here in the UK  (who was from back home relatively recently i.e. in the last 10 years or so, said something that I think is very perceptive): In a conversation with someone else about land/property back home, who was talking about governmental and mafia grabs (often co-related), he said, before even that, your own family will try and grab the land.   

I think people shouldn't presume any level of security there. Family muscle and contacts seem to play a big part in this. 

[weareallone]

6 hours ago, dallysingh101 said:

It seems like there's a culture of land-snatching amongst Panjabis. I might be wrong, and I'd like to hear alternative opinions, but I think anyone investing over there needs to grasp this. 

On top of the external forces, one highly educated guy I met here in the UK  (who was from back home relatively recently i.e. in the last 10 years or so, said something that I think is very perceptive): In a conversation with someone else about land/property back home, who was talking about governmental and mafia grabs (often co-related), he said, before even that, your own family will try and grab the land.   

I think people shouldn't presume any level of security there. Family muscle and contacts seem to play a big part in this. 

That’s quite tragic isn’t it? I’ve been to several states and it seems that the greed for land is perhaps the greatest in Indian Punjab. I have several Pakistani Punjabi friends and there isn’t apparently this extent of greed there. Indeed people still happily live traditionally in mud houses without electricity. There's still also forests and waterfalls in Lehnda Punjab but Chardha Punjab (and Haryana) has the lowest forest cover in India at 0.5% (i.e. non existent); every square inch has been exploited for commercial farming.

I don't want to cause any offence but from my understanding, the land greed and family feuds are associated with Jat culture. I know a few people who have murdered their own brothers over land disputes. There's also a significant disenfranchisement of Dalits- who own no land in spite of making up a third of the population. From a historical perspective, 70% of Punjab (including Haryana) was forest before British rule. The trees were clear-cut, lions and tigers exterminated, and all that land was handed over to loyal Jats. At the same time, in a move similar to Enclosure in England, Commons were dissolved and handed over to the Jats- rendering Dalits landless and in permanent servitude as a slave/manual labour class- which continues till today.

That said, as an ethnic Punjabi, why should I live elsewhere? I'm living in India now and it's embarassing having to float between other states.

So safe or not, government-mafia nexus, nepotism and social Jat greed notwithstanding, I need 10 acres land in Punjab for reforestation and self-sufficiency and am hoping that there's someone who can help indicate land prices and geographical features in different districts So that I can shortlist my options. I don't have 10 years to research by wandering around Punjab (and probably getting almost lynched again). Please help!

 

[dallysingh101]

16 hours ago, weareallone said:

That’s quite tragic isn’t it? I’ve been to several states and it seems that the greed for land is perhaps the greatest in Indian Punjab. I have several Pakistani Punjabi friends and there isn’t apparently this extent of greed there. Indeed people still happily live traditionally in mud houses without electricity. There's still also forests and waterfalls in Lehnda Punjab but Chardha Punjab (and Haryana) has the lowest forest cover in India at 0.5% (i.e. non existent); every square inch has been exploited for commercial farming.

 

 

Not good. I don't think our lot are too creative economically, and this plays a part. So if they see something that works they pile onto it. Sadly it doesn't help with creating a sustainable, diverse economy.

 

Quote

I don't want to cause any offence but from my understanding, the land greed and family feuds are associated with Jat culture. I know a few people who have murdered their own brothers over land disputes. There's also a significant disenfranchisement of Dalits- who own no land in spite of making up a third of the population. From a historical perspective, 70% of Punjab (including Haryana) was forest before British rule. The trees were clear-cut, lions and tigers exterminated, and all that land was handed over to loyal Jats. At the same time, in a move similar to Enclosure in England, Commons were dissolved and handed over to the Jats- rendering Dalits landless and in permanent servitude as a slave/manual labour class- which continues till today.    

Even if it started from here, it's now prevalent through all sections of apna society. It might be majority cultural influence on others over time? 

The inequality in our society is sad. There is hard resistance to any efforts to level things up in an proSikhi egalitarian way. Colonialism really skewed our social structure. 

[proactive]

On 2/19/2023 at 4:01 AM, weareallone said:

That’s quite tragic isn’t it? I’ve been to several states and it seems that the greed for land is perhaps the greatest in Indian Punjab. I have several Pakistani Punjabi friends and there isn’t apparently this extent of greed there. Indeed people still happily live traditionally in mud houses without electricity. There's still also forests and waterfalls in Lehnda Punjab but Chardha Punjab (and Haryana) has the lowest forest cover in India at 0.5% (i.e. non existent); every square inch has been exploited for commercial farming.

I don't want to cause any offence but from my understanding, the land greed and family feuds are associated with Jat culture. I know a few people who have murdered their own brothers over land disputes. There's also a significant disenfranchisement of Dalits- who own no land in spite of making up a third of the population. From a historical perspective, 70% of Punjab (including Haryana) was forest before British rule. The trees were clear-cut, lions and tigers exterminated, and all that land was handed over to loyal Jats. At the same time, in a move similar to Enclosure in England, Commons were dissolved and handed over to the Jats- rendering Dalits landless and in permanent servitude as a slave/manual labour class- which continues till today.

That said, as an ethnic Punjabi, why should I live elsewhere? I'm living in India now and it's embarassing having to float between other states.

So safe or not, government-mafia nexus, nepotism and social Jat greed notwithstanding, I need 10 acres land in Punjab for reforestation and self-sufficiency and am hoping that there's someone who can help indicate land prices and geographical features in different districts So that I can shortlist my options. I don't have 10 years to research by wandering around Punjab (and probably getting almost lynched again). Please help!

 

My mother used to tell us that when she was a youngster in the 1930s, not much care was taken of land and there were even people who used to complain if they had lots of land because they had to find tenants to farm it and get a good income from it. The loss of millions of acres during partition and the decrease in acreage per family led to land prices going up and tenants being easy to find and get good income. My family hasn't farmed for three generations as we have been giving land on maamla since the 1950s. We have land in the local town which is very valuable and which we are aiming to sell and buy 15-20 acres in or around our village and I would love grow Avacados or other 'superfoods' to sell and invest the profits into job creation schemes in the village. 

As for the commons or SHAAMLAAT land, this was not land handed over to Jats by the British.  This land which usually centres around a well or KHOOH, was land that belonged to the founders of the village who in our Punjab would invariably have been Jats who allowed it for the use of the whole village. Technically this land belongs to the descendants of the original founders of the village and this is how it is shown on the revenue records. This can be dozens of families or more. The land is shown by Patti which is the line of descent from one of the founders of the village. Thus all families descended from that founder and shown as owners of this Shaamlaat land. The government attempted to give this Shaamlaat land to the Dalits of the village or transfer it to Panchayat ownership which many villages protested against. You can see their point, if the government wants to give Dalits land then why doesn't it buy the land from the legal owners. This scheme was devised by the Congress to gain Dalits votes and create factions in the villages. In our village the Shaamlaat was divided by all the descendent families before it could be taken over by the Panchayat or given to Dalits. We got our share which is about 3m x 10m which we use as a store.