“Deendayal Upadhyaya has become the political brand equity for the Bharatiya Janata Party that Gandhi was for the Congress Party,” a prominent BJP member asserted in 2017. And indeed, at the close of yearlong celebrations of the birth centenary of Upadhyaya (1916-68), the erstwhile General Secretary (1952-68) of the BJP’s forerunner Bharatiya Jana Sangh, there was reason to believe this was the case. Since its return to power with a majority in India’s Lok Sabha in 2014, the BJP made concerted efforts to elevate Upadhyaya to the status of national icon.

What are the economic costs of ill-functioning Indian land markets? The news and public policy discussions on land often revolve around land acquisition by governments, like the Tata Nano Singur case or the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation, and Resettlement (LARR) Act of 2013. But the use of, or lack thereof, eminent domain stems from fundamental problems that make Indian land markets malfunction.