As India struggles to reverse the economic slowdown that has followed a decade of high growth rates, it is increasingly becoming clear that a critical determinant of our economic future will be the handling of problems surrounding the land. There are two major reasons why this is so. The reallocation of resources from agriculture to manufacturing and services is the sine qua non of development. This structural transformation cannot be achieved without rapid improvements in the agricultural productivity and release of enough surplus labour to run the factories. Low yields in Indian agriculture have a lot to do with the imperfections in land markets – inequality, fragmentation, lack of good land records, ill-defined and often insecure property rights, the disincentives of tenancy, and the inability to use land titles as collateral that lead to credit constraints. Unless measures are taken to increase productivity significantly, food supply could become a serious bottleneck. The second reason that land is so important is, our high population relative to land available, and its concentration in fertile areas. In India, the space required for non-agricultural production must come largely at the expense of farmland. Stiff resistance to land acquisition has sprung up all across the country in the last decade or so from the Narmada Bachao Andolan to Singur. It is the sign of a maturing democracy that it is no longer easy to evict poor people in the name of progress.