Backdrop and Context

To manage and develop India’s vast rainfed landscape, that cover 51% of India’s net sown land and contribute 40% of food production, while sustaining  large rural livelihoods and livestock, the National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA) strengthens soil health, enhances productivity, and promotes resilience through soil and water conservation. By coordinating schemes and prioritising interventions such as soil fertility and crop diversification, NRAA aims to improve food security, livelihoods, and reduce poverty for communities dependent on rainfed lands.

As climate changes and global and local imperatives converge on Nature-based and Community-led solutions, with multi-actor partnerships and investments, landscape restorations esp.  rainfed geographies are fast becoming the key destinations. Rainfed ecosystems in India are  not only biophysical terrains, they are also socio-ecological and cultural landscapes, shaped and reshaped, predominantly by local communities,  in interaction with state and other actors through policies and investments. Rainfed ecosystems are the result of the way common lands (incl pasture, forests and wetlands) and agricultural lands (incl farmlands and orchards) are spatially and temporally managed, not only through management practices (traditional and modern)  but also, the way, they are governed through formal land administration and customary norms, reflecting diverse de facto and de jure forms of land tenure and access. For example, fallowing of land has been observed to be more prevalent in villages, where tenancy (even if informal) practice is less.

Rainfed lands are also poverty geographies of India, inhabited by a majority of its poor population, most of whom are landless and tenants/sharecroppers or women farmers. According to the National Statistical Office (NSO) Situation Assessment of Agricultural Households Survey, 2018-19, 17.3% of India’s 101.98 million hectares of operational land is leased-in, representing 13% of the country’s total cultivable land. Most of such rainfed farmers as well as pastoralists, forest products/food foragers, and wetland users lack formal or documented tenure viz. name in the land records or formal user/management (viz nistar) rights. A farmer continues to be identified, based on the name in land records, at least for accessing public service entitlements (viz KCC, PMKisan, NREGS, Agri DBT etc.).

With almost 75% of public agri-investments now going to persons/individuals, mostly based on name on land records, most of these poor in rainfed areas involved in land development/management/farming miss these benefits. Not only does it miss real poverty targets, but also it deprives the degraded rainfed land of these investments, thereby keeping the soil-health and fertility poor and land degraded.

Increasing focus on agroecological transformation, is incumbent upon resilient common lands (viz pasture, wetlands, forests and temporal fallows as commons), surrounding farmlands in mosaics in India’s villages, for reducing habitat fragmentation, enhancing nutrient flows, pollination and also for promoting natural and botanical predation. Most of the livestock population being open grazed, cow dung economy that improves farmlands, are also commons-based. However the tenure twilights in the commons, along with less attention in land administration bottlenecks, achievement of promises of commons, despite substantive investments.

NRAA has been crafting favorable policy and investment environments and also extending substantive support to improve management practices in rainfed areas, in collaboration with other government ministries/agencies (viz Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare, Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Department of Land Resources, National Disaster Management Agency etc.) as well as with research institutes and CSOs. Effectiveness and impact of such efforts and investment, on intended goals viz. Food security or poverty alleviation, or expected means, soil health and fertility improvements, often, remain less achieved, because of the lack of attentios and actions on tenure gaps in farm and common lands.

The tenure gap also becomes more critical in the context of climate change, as extreme and erratic weather events become increasingly frequent. Informal cultivators and tenants face a double disadvantage. On one hand, they lack access scheme support such as irrigation, crop insurance, and farm inputs to become more resilient. On the other hand, they get excluded from post disaster relief and compensation. The combined impact of climate stress and tenure based exclusion not only pushes many informal farmers to exit the sector but also leads to increased fallow land and reduced overall agricultural productivity.

Therefore, embedding land user relationships and a tenure lens into landscape restoration and watershed planning, soil conservation, drought mitigation, and compensation frameworks is imperative. There have been many good practices by states and other actors, around legal, institutional and technology innovations, to embed land tenure realities  to land use solutions.  Linking land use planning to actual land users, cultivators and tillers enhances access to benefits and therefore incentivises them to invest in long term land health, ensuring that investments are better targeted, resource management is more sustainable, and local resilience is strengthened.

Triggering the Process: Pathways to Solutions

Since NRAA is already advancing investments, planning, and development for land management and soil sustainability in rainfed areas, its role can be complemented by catalysing inclusive land tenure solutions and innovations, in partnership with appropriate actors. Existing legal and institutional reforms can be leveraged and new innovations can be triggered to ensure adaptive tenure integration with government schemes, and/or donor/CSR projects. This can be achieved by actively interfacing with initiatives led by central and state government departments, ongoing efforts by CSOs (such as PRADAN and FES), funders (such as BMGF), and private players involved in inclusive/fair supply chains or in CSR funding catalyse the pathway toward effective solutions.

Status of Legal and Institutional Tenancy Reforms

Some states, such as Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra, have already taken progressive steps on tenancy reforms, following Model land Leasing Act, 2016 drafted by NITI Aayog, while others, including Odisha and Punjab, are advancing toward greater inclusion. At the same time, several CSOs have contributed through institutional innovations. Cross learning from these state level experiences, alongside CSO models such as Kudumbashree and PRADAN’s intensive work, can offer valuable insights into the reforms introduced and how such innovations can be adapted and scaled further in the rainfed regions.

Leveraging and Aligning with Existing GoI Systems and Initiatives

Ongoing initiatives such as DILRMP/ULPIN and AgriStack, around digital land records, also try to maintain farmer registries and crop sown data. Their efforts can be leveraged to include documenting tenants or actual cultivators, adapting to the state’s legal and institutional frameworks. Similarly, Gram Panchayat Development Plans (GPDP) can house land people registries and facilitate the convergence of MGNREGS/PRI funds with Watershed Development Component of Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (WDC-PMKSY) micro plans. State-level schemes, such as DAJGUA in tribal rainfed areas, can identify women cultivators, pastoralists, and Community Forest Resource (CFR) committees, ensuring they are recognised and systematically included in watershed planning and benefit flows.

Strategic Actions and Way Forward: Leveraging ILDC 2025 (Ahmedabad, Nov 18–20)

To begin with, a preliminary collaborative conversation around the tenure opportunities for more inclusive and resilient restoration at ILDC2025, can be organised. India Land and Development Conference, for the last eight years, has been working as a convergence platform to trigger catalytic inter-sectoral conversation. A dedicated session or roundtable can be carefully crafted to ensure in-depth dialogue and nuanced brainstorming. This session would examine the legal and institutional measures adopted by different states to recognise tenure, alongside ongoing initiatives of ministries and departments where land records and tenure details remain incomplete, unupdated, fragmented, or in need of integration for a comprehensive view. By convening DoLR, MoPR, state representatives, CSOs, women cultivators, and pastoralist voices, ILDC can bring together diverse perspectives to initiate and build on timely and relevant discussions on sustainable land management, soil health, and resilience. The session would highlight the importance of embedding tenure considerations into watershed and rainfed development planning to strengthen resilience and ensure sustainable outcomes.

Objective of the Session

• To examine why integrating land tenure considerations is critical for sustainable watershed and rainfed development.

• Discuss how tenure gaps affect access to public investments, climate resilience, and long-term soil and land health

• Present state-level legal, institutional, and technological innovations for recognising tenants, women farmers, pastoralists, and community land users.

• Highlight successful states and CSO models and learnings for inclusion in land management.

• Discuss opportunities to leverage national initiatives such as AgriStack, DILRMP/ULPIN, and GPDP for inclusive land-use planning.

Expected Outcomes

• A policy note on legal, institutional, and technological innovations for embedding tenure in rainfed restoration.

• Potential pilot projects or joint advocacy platforms for tenure inclusive land and watershed management.

• Documenting case studies highlighting state reforms and CSO interventions.