Opening The Hills: The Ecological Cost Of Land Reform

Tikender Singh Panwar

The Himachal Pradesh government has again opened the debate on relaxing Section 118 of the Himachal Pradesh Tenancy and Land Reforms Act, 1972 — a provision that has, for five decades, protected the state’s most sacred resource: its land. Under this Section, a non-agriculturist cannot buy land in Himachal without prior permission from the state government. This legislative instrument ensures that land is not reduced to a commodity but continues to embody livelihood, culture and ecological balance.Today, in the name of “encouraging investment, industry, tourism and housing”, the state government is tempted to loosen this protective clause. But to tamper with Section 118 is to play with fire.

The Section was designed to protect the fragile Himalayan economy from being devoured by speculative capital and real-estate expansion. Himachal’s economy was meant to grow on its natural strengths: horticulture, smallholder farming, forest resources and local entrepreneurship, not on speculative trade of its slopes.It is being argued relaxing Section 118 will attract investment and accelerate development. However, in the past two decades, the state has granted hundreds of relaxations for hydropower, cement plants and tourism ventures. But have we seen industrial transformation or sustained job creation? Hardly.

Hydropower projects displaced communities and disrupted river ecosystems. Cement industries extracted more from the earth than they gave to the local economy. Highways have ripped into forests and destabilised slopes.When the BJP government in August 2018 attempted to relax Section 118 to allow employees and their wards to buy land without permission, the move was resisted. The government had to retract. The present push must therefore be viewed with caution.Already, the cracks are visible.

According to the Town and Country Planning Department, 60% of the new constructions in Kasauli, Dharampur and Manali belong to non-locals. Much of this caters to tourists, investors and urban people seeking second homes.The ecological consequences are grave. The carrying capacity of our hill towns is exhausted. There is a mounting crisis of water scarcity, solid-waste disposal and traffic congestion. In the aftermath of last year’s devastating rains and landslides, it is evident that Himachal’s hills are sliding away under unplanned development. Relaxing Section 118 would mean speeding up this process. It would effectively legalise the commodification of land and formalise the influx of speculative capital.

The experience of Uttarakhand is a grim reminder — over 40% of the land there is reportedly owned by non-locals and local communities are increasingly priced out of their own settlements. Goa presents another cautionary tale, where the coast has been devoured by tourism-driven real estate, and the original inhabitants can no longer afford to live near their ancestral beaches.

In contrast, Sikkim offers a more thoughtful model. There, land protections remain intact and development has been pursued through cooperatives, community-based tourism and ecological safeguards. Sikkim demonstrates growth without resorting to land sale.The notion that “outside investment” will bring prosperity to Himachal is flawed.

The major investments so far —hydropower and cement — have neither diversified the economy nor created enduring local enterprise. Instead, they have eroded ecology. The promise of jobs remains unfulfilled; instead, we have inherited deforestation, drying rivers and destabilised slopes.The future lies in decentralised, cooperative economies — agriculture and horticulture cooperatives, local agro-processing units, forest produce enterprises and eco-tourism owned by locals, strengthening animal husbandry, a nascent form of which is being imagined by the current state government.

Cooperative activism has shown promise in the state, such as apple growers’ collectives, women’s self-help groups and panchayat-led initiatives in waste management and renewable energy.With a fertility rate below 1.5, the state is witnessing population stabilisation. The argument that vast tracts of land lie unused or that there is “room” for expansion is misleading. The challenge is not scarcity of people but scarcity of meaningful livelihoods. Youth migrate because they find no dignified local opportunities.Relaxing Section 118 is a political and ecological gamble. It may bring applause from investors and land brokers, but it will eventually scorch the foundation of HP’s identity.

The Supreme Court, too, has taken cognisance of the state’s ecological vulnerability, emphasising the need for sustainable urban planning and restraint in hill development. Himachal stands at a critical crossroads. Section 118 is not a relic of the past; it is a living covenant between the people and their mountains. To touch it carelessly is to betray the very idea of Himachal.

Tikender Singh Panwar, a former directly elected Deputy Mayor of Shimla, has contributed to the Leh Vision document and has developed vision plans for over a dozen cities. He is the author of three books, an urban specialist in inclusive city design, and is currently a member of the Kerala Urban Commission.

This article was first published in The Tribune as Relaxing Himachal’s land rule will risk ecology on 4th January, 2026.

Disclaimer: All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organisation.