Understanding land for peace
26-Jul-2019
Aaron Keishing
This article gives the nature of how the land works but with an object to understand land for peace. Here we go! There is usually increased supply of the gross produce or service from land owing to more intensive use as population increases, but higher demand for land all in all inspires no supply reaction, rather, it basically raises the entire structure of rents. Because, there is no new supply of land. The total area of land in a country or State is fixed, while the population and human wants are not; the overall planet is fixed, the political jurisdiction and the land of Manipur are fixed, our resources are scarce, however population and human wants continues expanding. Individuals need better food, clothing, housing, better educational and medical facilities and entertainment. But, there isn't sufficient to go around. Land is totally limitational. It would not make any difference much if we live in a universe of plenty where there is sufficient of everything for everyone. Rather, we live in a universe of scarcity - shortage of land and resources.
Land is essential to everything. Land can exist perfectly well without labor or capital, and support timber and wildlife, however men and economy can't exist at all without at least some land, and often a lot of land is required. Varieties of labor won't do; there must be at least some land. Without land there is nothing. Coupling this with the non-reproducibility of land and its fixity, land is distinctively indispensable to life. It is, therefore, land and resources should be distributed in such a way where everybody has no less than a shelter home and a wellspring of survival. And one can always safeguard, acquire or transfer land in accordance with law and not by claiming ownership randomly or by fighting or by illegal means; individuals should have to explore those legal means.
Men always require food, water, and somewhere to stand. If you are landless and can't pay the rent, you can live in a tent, but you can't do even that without a piece of land. “Satellites and space stations work without land but they are launched, powered, controlled, and supplied from the earth. Micro-chips and such use so little land that land is irrelevant, but these items are also made and assembled on land.” (Lipsey and Chrystal).
Acquiring land fundamentally implied taking from others. Nobody can get more land without others keeping less, on the grounds that there is no new supply of land. As such, land supply is settled permanently. The aggregate topographical zone of Manipur is 22,327 sq. km out of which plain areas cover 2,248 sq. km, and hill regions cover 20,089 sq. km, which are both fixed.
Suppose individuals from valley areas get more lands by acquisition from the hill individuals or vice-versa. In both the cases, one cannot have more without others keeping less. Along these lines, the expansion of land by tribes or non-tribes fundamentally debilitates the hill or valley, all things considered, with respect to land ownership by similar measures that reinforces the expansionists. In this way, getting land must mean taking from others, in other words, more ownership by one individual or group implies less possession by others. To expand by one is to contract by another, unavoidably. Amassing land needs to deprive others; concentrated holding and control of land has always been threats to the well-being of those left out. Amassing land is always done, can only be done, by shrinking the holdings of others. To expand is to preempt, as there is no flow of supply.
Individuals from valleys can accumulate more capital by saving, making new capital, leaving hills with as much as earlier. Tribes can build their work earnings by working longer, or harder, or more intelligent, creating all the more, leaving plain individuals with as much as before. One can obtain more capital through saving and investment. One can consume more by working more, while others work no less. Possessing land, in any case, implies just one thing: pre-empting others, for a real estate parcel can't be occupied by two things at the same time. For example, you got a driving license which conferred a right to drive, yet in addition your driver's license is also a right to use land. Red lights imply that two things can't occupy a similar space at the same time. A land parcel can be utilized for various purposes, yet its size can't be changed. An "open economy" is available to money and good, to capital and labor, but not to land. Since land supply or the areas of overall planet is fixed, permanently.
Yes, for all men, land is indispensable, it is life, and land is everything, it is worth dying for, but “anything worth dying for ... is certainly worth living for.” (Joseph Heller, Catch-22). Land is limited yet indispensable does not mean all individuals should languish and die over it. The more vital thing is: the law in regards to land transfer must be outlined that no one got too less or excessively and look for the logical intends to accommodate all population. We must acknowledge that the value of land is created not by its “owners,” but by the entire community. The service flow of land is a free gift of God, which simply exists. The buyer does not create it, nor cause others to create it; he simply acquires it. We commonly share our land and resources directly or indirectly; we have consumed the products from plain areas as well as hill areas and also shared our resources although some individuals own to the exclusion of others.
Sir William Blackstone, the pre-eminent authority on English law, wrote in his Commentaries: "The earth and all things therein are the general property of all mankind, from the gift of the creator." This idea of the land belonging to all humanity, to the community as a whole, is not entirely inoperative today. Public parks, roads, school grounds, public building sites, many wilderness areas, lakes and ocean fronts are recognized as the common property of all.” To quote Massasoit, "What is this you call property? It cannot be the earth, for the land is our mother, nourishing all her children, beasts, birds, fish and all men. The woods, the streams, everything on it belong to everybody and are for the use of all. How can one man say it belongs only to him?"
Be that as it may, answer for an issue including land shortage isn't beyond human capacities. The first computer used to occupy a large room, however now we require just a little space for the same. The previous (2015) micro-computer, the Michigan Micro Mote (M3), measured 2x2x4 mm. But in March of 2018, IBM announced a new, smaller computer, which measured just 1x1 mm, and was smaller than a grain of salt. Further, the productivity of agricultural land increased in quite unexpected ways with the invention of the vast range of new machines, crops, and farming techniques that characterize modern agriculture. A Century ago over half of the workforce of developed nations was producing food to feed the rest; today a mere 3-5 per cent of the workforce produces enough to feed everyone in those nations, with substantial margins left over for export. Thus, rather than fighting for land, we should invented scientific means for proper management of our land and given spaces in co-operation with each other, since fighting won't create more lands.
The writer is an Advocate of High Court of Manipur and can be reached at 8794445913