Loss Of Agricultural Land To Urban Expansion In India: Patterns, Drivers And Policy Concerns 1991 To 2022

Abstract

India has experienced rapid urban growth since the 1991 economic liberalisation, and this process has led to widespread conversion of agricultural land into built-up areas. Using data drawn from the Directorate of Economics and Statistics (Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare), Census of India reports, and land-cover classifications produced by the National Remote Sensing Centre up to 2022, this study maps the scale and geography of farmland loss across three decades. At the national level, land placed under non-agricultural uses increased from 18.3 million hectares in 1991-92 to 26.9 million hectares in 2021-22, whereas net sown area shrank by roughly 1.8 million hectares even as population rose sharply. The most severe declines have occurred in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka, with peri-urban rings around Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Chennai showing the highest rates of built-up expansion. Economic reforms, real-estate speculation, loosely regulated Special Economic Zones, lax zoning enforcement, and large infrastructure projects have jointly driven this transformation. The resultant effects include slower growth in food-grain output, displacement of marginal farmers and landless labourers, degradation of groundwater recharge zones, and heightened food-security risks. Although several protective laws and policy documents have appeared over the years, implementation has remained weak. The paper argues that, without binding safeguards for high-quality agricultural land and a deliberate shift towards compact and vertical urban development, India will continue to lose its productive soil base irreversibly.