Hi Friends,

Even as I launch this today ( my 80th Birthday ), I realize that there is yet so much to say and do. There is just no time to look back, no time to wonder,"Will anyone read these pages?"

With regards,
Hemen Parekh
27 June 2013

Now as I approach my 90th birthday ( 27 June 2023 ) , I invite you to visit my Digital Avatar ( www.hemenparekh.ai ) – and continue chatting with me , even when I am no more here physically

Thursday, 3 July 2025

Who gets how many sq ft area ?

 


 

Can every citizen of India get allotted 5,000 sq ft of our land ?

Can he / she be given “ Ownership Title “ to such parcel of land ?

By no stretch of imagination, I am suggesting any such thing , knowing that this is just not possible

But I strongly believe that this is possible ( - and a eminent case for JUDICIAL INTERVENTION ) :

“ Even if built illegally on Govt land , no hutments / zopad-patti / slum , built by VERY POOR people , shall be razed before, first providing them with pucca alternate accommodation ( not Transit Camps ) “

Dear Supreme Court :

Please treat this ( Suo Moto ) as a Public Interest Litigation

 

With regards,

Hemen Parekh

www.IndiaAGI.ai / www.HemenParekh.ai / www.My-Teacher.in / www.HemenParekh.in

 

I asked  www.IndiaAGI.ai  :

If India's land area was divided by its population ( nos ) , then how many sq ft will each citizen get as share ? “

 

www.IndiaAGI.ai  replied :

The initial calculation of about 21,867 square feet per person, based on India's total land area of 2,973,190 square kilometers and a projected 2025 population of around 1.46 billion, offers a clear theoretical benchmark.

However, as we've explored through various angles, this figure doesn't hold up when we factor in the real-world nuances like habitability, urbanization, socioeconomic inequalities, and environmental limits. Let's synthesize the key points from our discussion to arrive at a more grounded estimate and outline what this means moving forward.

From the refinements shared, adjusting for arable land alone—estimated at 156.4 million hectares—brings the per-person share down to roughly 11,500 square feet.

But when we account for uninhabitable areas like forests (covering about 24% of the land), deserts, and mountains, the effective share could drop further, potentially to a range of 5,000–10,000 square feet per person.

Urban areas, where density is extreme (e.g., around 500 square feet per person in Mumbai ), pull this average even lower, while rural regions might offer more space but face accessibility challenges. There's broad agreement that socioeconomic factors, such as unequal land ownership where the top 10% control 55% of rural land, mean this adjusted figure still overestimates what most people can actually access or utilize.

The strongest arguments center on the need for a multi-layered approach: using tools like GIS to refine habitability metrics, integrating regional planning to ease urban pressures, promoting community-driven models for equity, and embedding nature-based solutions for sustainability.

For instance, initiatives like the Rurban Mission and Kudumbashree demonstrate how blending rural and urban strategies could make land distribution more practical. However, a persistent gap lies in the lack of precise, India-specific data on habitable land percentages, which leaves some uncertainty in these estimates—highlights like the National Land Use and Cover Mapping Program help, but they don't fully resolve this.

To push this forward, focusing on dynamic solutions like digitizing land records and participatory planning could bridge these gaps. In the end, while the math gives us a range to work with, the real value lies in translating it into policies that ensure land is not just divided but equitably managed and sustainable for everyone.

For reference, here's a compiled overview of the sources we've drawn from, grouped by theme for clarity:

·         Population and Land Area Basics (from DeepSeek's initial response):

o    "India Population (2025)" - Worldometer

o    "India - Land Area" - Trading Economics

·         Habitable and Arable Land Insights (from Gemini's search and ongoing discussion):

o    General habitable land comparisons - r/geography on Reddit

o    Land use statistics overview - Land use statistics by country - Wikipedia

o    India's habitable land claims - r/india on Reddit

o    Global arable land rankings - Arable Land by Country 2025

o    Comparative habitable land analysis - Which country has the most habitable land? - Quora

o    Agricultural land use globally - Half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture

o    Russia's habitable land as a contrast - How much of Russia is actually habitable

o    Overall land use trends - Land Use

o    Additional context on agriculture - 50% of all land in the world is used to produce food

·         Urbanization and Policy Approaches (from GPT, DeepSeek, and Claude):

o    Urban land pressure and planning - The Hindu on Kudumbashree land trusts

o    National Urban Digital Mission - Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs

o    Shyama Prasad Mukherji Rurban Mission - Ministry of Rural Development

o    Landesa's land tenure programs - Landesa - Land Rights in India

·         Environmental Sustainability and Related Data (from DeepSeek, GPT, and Claude):

o    Global Footprint Network on biocapacity - Country Overshoot Day

o    India’s forest cover and deforestation - Global Forest Watch

o    Miyawaki method for urban afforestation - The Better India

o    National Land Use and Cover Mapping - National Remote Sensing Centre

·         Other Supporting Sources (from various responses):

o    World Inequality Database on land ownership - World Inequality Database

o    Digital India Land Records Modernization Programme - NITI Aayog and related reports

This foundation of references underscores the need for ongoing data collection and policy innovation to make land distribution more than just a theoretical exercise—ensuring it's fair, sustainable, and responsive to India's diverse needs.

 

 

 

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