Introduction:

The Supreme Court has asked the governments of 17 states to evict an estimated one million tribal and other households living in forests after their claims of the right to live in forests were rejected under the Forest Rights Act. As a consequence, more than one million tribals could be displaced, mainly in central India. The court has directed the Dehradun-based Forest Survey of India to submit a satellite-image based report on the encroachments removed.

 Body:

The petitioners, all conservationists, have qualified the objectives of their petition and highlighted the case for safeguarding the forests against “bogus claims to forest rights”, calling for the state to take action against the loss of forest cover. The SC ruling has once again highlighted the dilemma of reconciling inalienable tribal rights with biodiversity conservation.

The rationale to satisfy the needs of the forest dwellers:

• FRA was passed with the wholly welfarist goal of making these communities partners in conservation. They would be stewards of forests that have shrunk and become fragmented over the decades.
• By recognizing and vesting forest rights to local people, the FRA empowers forest dwelling communities to manage natural resources and conserve
• Forest Rights Act protected possession and conferred heritability of land to over 23 lakh out of 44 lakh claimants who are either specified Scheduled Tribes, or people who have lived in forests traditionally, relying on forest produce for at least 75 years prior to the cut-off year of 2005.
• Claims are being rejected without assigning reasons, or based on wrong interpretation of the provisions, or simply for lack of evidence or ‘absence of GPS survey’.
• The rejections are not being communicated to the claimants, and their right to appeal is not being explained to them or facilitated for.
• The mere rejection of claims by the state therefore does not mean that their possession of land is a crime of “encroachment”.
• Additionally, by envisaging and providing for local stewardship of forests, it creates a possibility of collaboration between local people, state agencies and other actors, on equal terms.
• The FRA offers the chance to rethink wildlife conservation approaches in protected areas too, by making local communities rights-holders in the forest and improving the governance at the local level.
• The presence of large resorts and the heavy footfall of tourists on these sites be legitimised while the rights of their original inhabitants remain challenged
• The Forest Rights Act was passed to enable them to regain their lost habitats. But there has been a failure of political will to implement this piece of legislation
• Hounded for the mineral wealth that their lands contain, cheated out of land rights by money lenders, and, caught between left-wing mobilisation, a life of penury and rampant alcoholism, many Adivasi communities live a disturbed life.
• Nature conservation programmes such as “Project Tiger” that seek to restore forests as pristine nature spaces have transformed forest-dwellers and turned Adivasis into eco-refugees.
• The original inhabitants live in impoverished colonies outside the sanctuaries and parks while the forest department’s writ runs large over these terrains.

The need to address the environmental concerns:

• Forests have shrunk to about 5% of the land in terms of protected areas, while human pressures are growing: landscapes are alienated for resource exploitation, road and dam building, and a lot of wildlife is lost to poaching.
• Man-animal conflict is growing.
• The illegal regimes of forest extraction continue, administrative laxity has permitted the growth of a nature tourism industry in the garb of ‘Eco-tourism’.
• The government’s own data shows that 14,00,000 ha of forests have been diverted since 1980 for non-forestry purposes, mainly for mining, defence projects, and hydroelectric projects. In response to a query in Parliament in 2016, it was officially accepted that up to 25,000 ha of forests are being diverted every year for non-forestry activities.
• Increasing incidents of forest fires like recently in Bandipur tiger reserve and Mudumalai reserve is a cause of concern.
• The despoliation of India’s forests by the mining, timber and tourism industries not been addressed.

Way Forward:

• There is an urgent need to treat Adivasis as envisaged in Nehru’s Tribal Panchsheel policy which was in support by Anthropologist s like Verrier Elwin, Thakar Bapa etc.
• Studies indicate the strength of tribal knowledge of forests and ecological resources. Such knowledge enabled not only the conservation of flora and biodiversity but also that of fauna.
• Resettlement: In some well-documented cases, such as in the Western Ghats, alternative land and cash compensation convinced tribals to move out of core areas. One example is that of the Nagarahole National Park, where the outcome has been good for both people and wildlife, as evidenced by the recovery of tiger density over three decades.
• State governments need to pursue such programmes in a humane and vigorous fashion. They must also come forward to declare critical wildlife habitats under the Act. This will aid in formulating resettlement schemes for tribal residents.

Conclusion:

Claims for tenure under the Forest Rights Act must therefore satisfy the primary test of whether they are legally unimpeachable, and even if they are, whether they would impose additional pressures on forests and wildlife.