Improving land access for India's rural poor

India's states have employed several land reform measures, including reforming tenancy, imposing land ceilings, distributing government wasteland, and allocating house sites and homestead plots. With relatively modest revisions, some of the existing laws and policies can further their original intent of increasing the poor's access to rural land and providing for secure land tenure. But old land reform approaches, such as blind adherence to land ceilings and tenancy reform, need reconsideration.