By Zacki Jabbar
The UNP has proposed the setting up of an "Independent body" that will decide on the division of land within a Provincial Council area, party sources said.

This proposal on land will be the fourth and final set of proposals the UNP will be submitting to the parliamentary select committee on Constitutional Reform this week.

In its first three sets of proposals the UNP called for power sharing at the centre coupled with asymmetrical devolution on a need basis, the setting up of independent public, police services and elections commissions among other proposals.

The UNP's committee on constitutional reform which met on Friday with Ranil Wickremesinghe in the chair was of the view that there should be a clear demarcation between land which should be retained by the state as state land, the provincial councils as provincial council land and local government authorities as local government land.

According to the proposal a provincial council could ask the "independent body" for more land by setting out the purposes it would be used for. If this is refused, the decision could be challenged in the supreme court .

"The question to be determined is who owns what. But provincial councils will not be permitted to own reserves such as forests, waterways, etc." the sources added.

The UNP proposal also speaks of furthering the 13th amendment formula for colonisation. This means there will be no change in the demography of the district.

"Our proposal states that you can't colonise to change the ethnic ratio in a district. The entitlement will be on the ethnic ratio but if you don't get it from a particular district you can get it from another district. We are offering a complete package - power sharing at the centre and real power at the periphery", the sources added.

The UNP committee includes Ronnie de Mel, Tyronne Fernando, K. N. Choksy, Mahinda Samarasinghe, Daya Pelpola, A. Kadiresan, Tilak Marapana, D. M. Swaminathan and Henry Jayamaha.