Standing in his sugarcane farm in Navsari's Sadlav village with his arms stretched wide apart, Pinakinbhai Patel explains that in 3.5 kilometers of his "fertile land", three major infrastructure projects have been planned.
"Right through this land, the Bharatmala road project will pass. One kilometer to the left the (Vadodara-Mumbai) expressway will be constructed and 2.5 kilometers to the right, the bullet train will pass," he said.
"Out of the 16 acres of my land, government wants seven acres for the Bharatmala project, but it is offering only four times the 'jantri rate', which is way lower than the market rate," he added.
'Jantri rate' is the minimum price of the land notified by the Gujarat government for a particular area.
Pinakinbhai's concerns are shared by a lot of farmers across Navsari and Valsad Lok Sabha constituencies of Gujarat, where polling will be held on Tuesday.
Months ahead of the polls, the BJP-led Gujarat government suspended the land survey for the Bharatmala project -- a centrally-sponsored scheme to construct 83,677 km of highways across India, in January.
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The decision came after around 15,000 farmers of Navsari's 23 villages held protests against the project in Chikhli town.
"I am worried because of the process being followed by the government for land acquisition," said Kunwarjibhai Patel, whose five acres of land beside Pinkainbhai's has also been earmarked for the Bharatmala project.
Pinakinbhai and Kunwarjibhai are Leuva Patels, a sub-caste of the Patidar community that has traditionally been loyal to the BJP.
The ambitious bullet train project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, also former Gujarat chief minister, has been making slow progress due to the land acquisition woes.
Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe laid the foundation stone for India's first bullet train project in Ahmedabad in September 2017. Japan is funding 80 per cent of the high-speed rail project between Ahmedabad and Mumbai.
The farmers say they are not opposed to acquisition of their lands, but they want the process to be transparent.
"Most of the farmers are willing to part with their lands for the bullet train project, but the government will have to conduct the land acquisition process transparently," said Dineshbhai Shashankbhai Patel, who owns just three bighas of land in Navsari's Pathri village.
Around one bigha of his land has been earmarked for the bullet train project.
"In October last year, the government directly began a land survey. They inserted the poles and then went on to drill to get soil for analysis. We held protests then," Dineshbhai said.
"The collector then held a meeting with farmers from 28 affected villages to convince them. Only after that we allowed the survey to take place," he added.
Not getting a price commensurate with the market rate for his land is an issue for Dineshbhai as well.
"The 'jantri rate' is around Rs 4-5 lakh per bigha here and the government is offering four times of this. But the market rate is around Rs 60 lakh per bigha. How can we give our lands like this?" he asks.
Siddharthbhai Desai of Navsari's Amadpore village, who will also have to part with some of his 150 bigha land for the bullet train project, echoed the sentiments.
"The market rate is Rs 1.5-2 crore per bigha here. However, the 'jantri rate' is Rs 4.5 lakh per bigha. How can any farmer agree to part with his land at such a price?" he asks.
Desai said since most of the farmers in Navsari and Valsad are small land holders, they stand to incur heavy losses.
"Some will lose all of their land. These farmers do not have any alternate source of income. That is why they are asking for a price four times the market rate," he added.
A farmer from Koli community -- the largest OBC group in Gujarat, in Valsad's Jujhwa village, who did not wish to be named, said the central government must understand that "development cannot happen at the cost of the tribal people."
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