Affected Family, Displaced Family and Person Interested

Three definitions distribute everything the Act gives: affected family fixes who consents and who is rehabilitated, displaced family fixes who is resettled, and person interested fixes who is heard and who shares the money. The 1894 Act had only the last. This note takes the three in turn, with the working consequences of each limb.

1. Affected Family: The Six Limbs

Limb	Who it covers	The protective idea
Land losers	Family whose land or other immovable property is acquired	The classical case: title holders
Livelihood losers	Landless families of agricultural labourers, tenants (including any form of tenancy), sharecroppers and artisans working in the affected area for three years before acquisition, whose primary livelihood is affected	Work, not title, as the basis of protection
Forest-right holders	Scheduled Tribes and other traditional forest dwellers losing rights recognised under the Forest Rights Act, 2006	Rights outside the revenue record counted in
Assignees	Families holding land assigned by the Central or State Government under any scheme	Beneficiaries of past welfare not dispossessed by present development
Forest and water dependents	Families dependent on forests or water bodies for livelihood: gatherers of forest produce, hunters, fisherfolk and boatmen	Commons-based livelihoods recognised
Urban livelihood losers	Families residing on land in urban areas or whose primary livelihood is affected by its acquisition, for three years preceding	The urban informal economy brought inside

Two working rules follow. Money and rehabilitation diverge: compensation under Chapter IV goes to those with interests in the acquired land, while the R&R award under Section 31 and the Second Schedule goes to every affected family, landless limbs included, which is the Act's real redistribution. The record is built early: the SIA census and the Administrator's survey (Sections 4 and 16) identify the affected families, so the SIA stage is where a family establishes, with residence and livelihood evidence, that it belongs.

2. The Family, and Women as Families

"Family" includes a person, spouse, minor children, and minor brothers and sisters dependent on the person, and the Act then makes its quiet gender reform: widows, divorcees and women deserted by families are treated as separate families. Each such woman counts separately in the consent tally and takes her own R&R entitlements, a correction to rehabilitation practice that had folded women into male-headed households (Topic 111 collects the gender dimensions). An adult of either gender with or without spouse or children may also constitute a family for the Act's purposes, as the definition provides.

3. Displaced Family

The definition: any family which, on account of acquisition, has to be relocated and resettled from the affected area to the resettlement area.
The consequence: displacement is the trigger for the Second Schedule's residential entitlements, the constructed house or house-site, the transportation allowance, the subsistence allowance for one year, the displacement-linked payments, and for the Third Schedule's resettlement infrastructure (Topics 48 and 49).
The relation: every displaced family is an affected family, but not the reverse; a family may lose livelihood without relocating, taking the livelihood entitlements but not the housing package, and multiple displacement attracts additional compensation (Section 39, Topic 51).

4. Person Interested

The hearing-and-money definition: all persons claiming an interest in the compensation, which the Act spells out to include the affected families themselves, persons with easements over the land, tenants and holders under State tenancy laws, and persons whose interests appear in the land records or are otherwise shown. The person interested files objections (Section 15), participates in the Collector's award enquiry (Section 23), seeks the reference to the LARR Authority (Section 64), and fights the apportionment (Sections 75 and 76). Under the 1894 Act the corresponding definition was read generously (a person claiming an interest was interested enough to be heard), and the 2013 text codifies that generosity. The three definitions thus assign the Act's three currencies: voice (person interested), money with rehabilitation (affected family) and resettlement (displaced family).

⚠ Key point

Affected family has six limbs, land losers, three-year livelihood losers, Forest Rights Act holders, assignees, forest and water dependents, and urban livelihood losers, and takes the R&R award even without title; widows, divorcees and deserted women count as separate families. Displaced family is the relocating subset, taking the housing and resettlement package. Person interested is the widest hearing class, everyone claiming an interest in the compensation, from owners to easement holders and tenants.

5. Related Topics and Provisions

Key definitions map (Topic 10): where these sit in Section 3
The R&R award and Second Schedule (Topics 47 and 48): what affected status buys
Gender and R&R (Topic 111): women as separate families, developed
Apportionment disputes (Topic 77): persons interested in conflict