Articles by C R Bijoy

Most of the North East enjoys unbridled authority over forests unlike the rest of the country, free from state control under the debilitating impact of the colonial-era Indian Forest Act, 1927. Therefore, the Forest Rights Act, 2006 is perceived as irrelevant. But, the sweeping expansion of how “forest” is defined in law by the Supreme Court and its proposed incorporation into the Indian Forest Act threatens the customary forest rights of these peoples.

Thirty-seven years since the Project Tiger, the decline in numbers is shocking - 1,827 tigers in 1972, only 1,411 today. Forest rights implementation has been sluggish with rampant violations and large-scale denial of rights, mostly by the forest bureaucracy, the revenue and tribal departments. An analysis of the legal provisions under various Acts reveals that none of the 39 notified Critical Tiger Habitats have obtained the consent of the forest dwellers and the gram sabhas, and are thus illegal. An elitist conservation policy, which has so far targeted only the tribals, has resulted in illegal encroachment and activities in the tiger reserves by the State.

The struggle in Plachimada, Kerala, against Coca-Cola not only raises issues of mindless destruction of groundwater by a multinational company, but also exposes the gross inadequacies in the laws of governance and the rights to water. It also exposes the inability of political democracy, as we know it, to address weaknesses in law and governance. The state government meekly surrendered the opportunity that the struggle bestowed at the altar of the judiciary, rather than take advantage of it for bold political decision-making. The Plachimada struggle calls for the recovery of the commons by communities.

The tragic events at Muthanga in Kerala earlier this year were a culmination of adivasi frustrations over the failure of successive governments in the state to restore adivasi land despite several judicial directives and the existence of laws enacted for the purpose, such as the KSA Act of 1975. Instead attempts were made to amend the act which was later wholly repealed. The protest of the adivasis at Muthanga met with brutal repression by the government. But chastened by the public anger at the police action, the government now remains immobilised in the face of a series of fresh land occupations by adivasis in the Kerala part of the Western Ghats. If the government were to handover the land in Muthanga to the adivasis and make other lands available to landless adivasi families and bring all adivasi regions under Schedule V of Article 244 which provides for participatory self-rule and autonomy, it would herald a new era in adivasi history.