Govind Kelkar, Landesa/Rural Development Institute, New Delhi

1. 1Footer Text
The Foggy Entitlement: Laws and Policy
Changes for Women’s Right to Land
Govind Kelkar
Landesa/Rural Development Institute, New Delhi
For UNDP/APRC Women’s A2J Consultation
June 9-10, 2014, Bangkok

2. Laws and Policies for Women’s Right to Land
• Legal frameworks in the region and within a country. The past
decade witnessed a serious questioning of the persistence of
gender inequality in land ownership.
• Results in laws and policy measures for women’s right to land:
China- Land contracting law in China (2003) stipulates that
women and men have equal rights in contracting land and the
contract issuing party (the Village Council) cannot take away her
original contracted land unless she receives land in her marital
village.
• Enacted to reinforce the 1949 Agrarian reform law which gave
women the right to own land in their names.

3. Laws and Policies for Women’s right to land
• Indonesia: In 2010 Draft Government Regulation of Agrarian
Reform and Stewardship of Land (in a stalemate, for further
discussion), a policy reform for women’s right to land.
• Women’s access to justice is a critical issue pursued by women’s
movement, initiated by the National Commission for Women
and women’s groups.
• Pakistan: While the Constitution of Pakistan gives women the
right to own and control property, but the realization of these
rights needs to understood in the context of larger cultural
framework that many a times supersedes her constitutional
right.
• Sind: the Sindh Land Distribution (2008) implemented in 17
districts, with 6,000 land titles distributed because women were
traditionally left out of land reform and had limited
opportunities to own land

4. Laws and Policies for Women’s right to land
• India: The Hindu Succession Amendment Act (2005) brings
women’s equality as daughters to inherit agricultural land and
property, daughter’s right at birth as coparcener, on par with
the son.
• 12th Five Year Plan (2013-2017) came up with a general
conclusion that measures for joint title to land introduced in
1986, 6th Five Year Plan have not worked, hence the policy for
land titles in individual names of women.
• Or land and group titles to women as the valid category of
land owners.
• Where joint titles have been realized, these should be made
partionable rights for women.

5. Challenges in Implementation: Why do land
governance systems fail women?
• In patriarchal system of land ownership in most of Asia,
(including Pakistan and Indonesia) women’s right to land is
limited only to use rights.
• Social norms support the ideological system of family which
maintains women’s dependency on men
• Continuing tradition of the man as the head of the household
also maintained in policy norms and development practices.
• Inheritance practices disfavour women.
• Lack of formal documentation of land in vast number of land
records.
• Women’s complicity, ignorance and reluctance to assert their
rights to land, civil society also shares this general reluctance.

6. • Increasing awareness regarding women’s rights to land in
communities, women’s groups, civil society organisations and
policy implementation bodies.
• Gender sensitivity and gender balance in land and revenue
administration.
• Addressing and understanding cultural norms. Patriarchal cultural
norms are clearly one of the slow moving institutions while
policies and laws for women’s legal rights to land inheritances are
relatively fast moving institutions. Concerted efforts to
implement these policies can influence change for egalitarian
gender and social relations.
Towards Closing the Gender Gap in Land Rights

7. Towards Closing the Gender Gap in Land Rights
• Research, surveys and documentation: how and in what
circumstances are women better able to advocate for
themselves and their daughters rights.
• Shifting land titles in women’s names in select areas: learnings
from these practices/examples in (Uttar Pradesh, India case
study)
• Legal literacy of women and men with regard to women’s land
rights.
• Individualisation of human rights and individualisation of
capabilities.