Land Reforms or Land Reclaims: Will Legal Ambiguities Enable Elite Capture?
By Sabrina Iqbal
On May 21, 2025, the Gilgit-Baltistan Assembly passed a landmark piece of legislation: the Gilgit-Baltistan Land Reforms Act, 2025. While government supporters welcomed it as a long-overdue attempt to empower locals by formalizing their ancestral land rights, critics labeled it a bureaucratic maneuver to reassert state control over community resources. Between these two poles of celebration and skepticism lies a need for sober, critical engagement—especially from those of us who live the realities this law is meant to shape.
I believe this Act deserves a deeper look—free from political noise, guided instead by clarity, legality, and equity. What does the law actually say? Who benefits from it? Who might lose out? And more importantly, how do vague legal definitions risk undermining the very rights this law promises to protect?
At its core, the Act aims to undo the colonial legacy of the Nautore Rules 1978, which treated most communal lands as state-owned “Khalsa Sarkar” property. The new law proposes to return ownership to the people—by identifying, classifying, and apportioning Common Partible Land among rightful local claimants, known legally as Haqdaran-e-Arazee.
To implement this, two new bodies have been created: The Gilgit-Baltistan Land Apportionment Board (GBLAB), chaired by the Chief Minister and empowered to make final decisions, and The District Land Apportionment Boards (DLABs), which are responsible for preparing land plans and submitting them to GBLAB for approval.
The Act divides land into three major categories: Common Partible Land – Land that can be shared among locals; Common Impartible Land – Natural assets like rivers, glaciers, and pastures that cannot be divided or owned individually; and Government Land – Land already under the control or listed as such in revenue records.
Herein lies the catch. Section 2(x) of the Act defines Government Land as: “land which has been allotted to, acquired, or purchased, or in possession of the GB Government or any Federal Government departments, institutions or authority or which has been entered in the revenue record of the settled district in the name of the Government or any Federal Government department, institution or authority”. This definition, while seemingly standard, is alarmingly vague. It doesn’t differentiate between disputed communal land and actual government property, especially in unsettled districts where revenue records do not exist. Nor does it take into account customary usage—a critical oversight in a region where ancestral grazing lands, forest routes, and seasonal pastures have been collectively used for generations.
Could this ambiguity be used to reclassify public lands as “state property” and hand them to powerful interests under the guise of “development”? The answer, unfortunately, is yes—if the law is not interpreted or enforced with caution and community oversight.
In a democratic legal system, every citizen must have the right to challenge administrative decisions, especially those involving ancestral rights. Yet, Section 18 of the Act blocks judicial intervention by invoking Section 172 of the Land Revenue Act, 1967. Section 17 further grants immunity to officials acting in “good faith.” This effectively prevents villagers from challenging wrongful classifications or land grabs in court. In parallel, Section 15 allows the Collector to summarily eject so-called “unlawful occupants” with just 15 days’ notice without trial—despite Article 10 of the GB Order, which guarantees due process. That’s not just a technical flaw; it’s a potential violation of constitutional rights.
To its credit, the Act does include some progressive reforms. It formally recognizes Haqdaran-e-Arazee, legitimizing local and tribal claims to village lands based on customary lineage. It introduces a framework for collective ownership—a sharp contrast to the top-down land allotments of the Nautore era. Additionally, it mandates that 10% of all apportioned land be set aside for public uses like schools, mosques, and graveyards (Section 21).
Still, for every step forward, there are lingering shadows. If land is misclassified as “Government Land”, it could legally be leased or sold to corporate developers, tourism projects, or government-linked enterprises—without the affected communities’ consent. Though Village Verification Committees are mentioned in the law, they hold limited power. Final authority rests with GBLAB and DLAB, dominated by bureaucrats and political figures—not the villagers themselves.
This law also provides little clarity on how land will be allocated to the landless, to women, or to minority tribes. While Section 12(9) mentions allocating land to destitute individuals, it fails to define how that process will work, leaving it susceptible to manipulation and exclusion.
The Assembly debates laid bare the tensions surrounding the Act. Opposition Leader Kazim Maisam walked out in protest, declaring: “From the river to the mountaintop, this land belongs to the people of Gilgit-Baltistan. No one has the authority to legislate on it without our consent.” Nationalist Leader Nawaz Khan Naji echoed public sentiment: “We must be prepared to sacrifice for the protection of our ancestral land.” Civil society has been no less vocal. Former Awami Action Committee Chairman Hafiz Sultan Rais called the Act a potential “legal tool for land grabbing in the name of development.”
The Gilgit Baltistan Land Reforms Act 2025 is neither inherently harmful nor a flawless gift. Its intentions—to redistribute land justly, empower locals, and end colonial hangovers—are admirable. But its loopholes, vague definitions, and lack of oversight could undermine those very goals. We need a clearer, tighter definition of Government Land. We need judicial oversight and independent review. We need public consultation, especially in unsettled villages and tribal communities. And we need to center women, the landless, and ethnic minorities not as footnotes but as rightful claimants in this conversation. The mountains may be still, but the people of Gilgit-Baltistan are not. And neither should the language of the law be.
The contributor is the founder of Gilgit based Summit Advocates & Legal Consultants.
