India's Transmission Land Grab: Maharashtra Farmers Demand Fair Compensation as Adani Line Rolls Through Villages

In Maharashtra, the tension between building transmission and respecting land rights has come to a head. NCP MLAs Sunil Shelke and Shankar Mandekar stood in the assembly to demand better compensation for farmers whose land is crossed by an Adani Energy Solutions transmission line through 42 villages in Maval and 18 in Bhor.^[1][2] The farmers' complaint is precise: the towers and overhead lines permanently degrade the land for agriculture, yet the compensation offered, based on a formula of highest land value plus 30% for the corridor, does not reflect that loss.^[5][6]

This is not NIMBYism; it is a structural grievance. The transmission owner earns a regulated return on the project, while the landowner receives a one-time payment and loses future productive use. State Minister Meghna Sakore-Bordikar pointed to the 2022 policy, which increased payouts and allowed farmers to retain ownership.^[5][6] But the core problem remains: the compensation is for an easement, not for the land's diminished value as an agricultural asset. As Shelke put it, “The farm land under the line will not remain useful for the farmers.”^[1]

Globally, this is a known failure mode. In the U.S., eminent domain for investor-owned transmission lines has long been a legitimate grievance, landowners are offered one-time easements while utilities collect decades of rate-base returns. The alternative exists: annual payments tied to the utility's revenue from the line, or community benefit agreements that share a portion of the project's profit. Maharashtra's policy still treats the land as a cost to be minimized, not a partner to be compensated fairly.

The Adani project serves an essential public purpose, reliability and renewable integration, but the way it is built matters. Farmers are not opposing the line; they are opposing the terms. The state's revised policy is a step forward from the pre-2010 era of no compensation, but it still falls short of making landowners whole.^[5]