Tribal Bill: The Inside Story

Lalit Shastri

The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance Government of India was determined and got the Scheduled Tribes (Recognition of Forest Rights) Bill cleared in Parliament in order to recognize and vest the forest rights and occupation in forest land to the Scheduled Tribes residing in forest areas ignoring strong objections that were raised by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF)at the outset.

The Union Cabinet Secretary had called a meeting of the Committee of Secretaries on April 28, 2005 to consider the “tentative Scheduled Tribes (Recognition of Forest Rights) Bill 2005” that had already been finalised by the Ministry of Law and Justice and the list of invitees for attending this meeting read as follows: Secretary Ministry of Environment and Forests, Prodipto Ghosh, Secretary Ministry of Law and Justice (Department of Legal Affairs), R.L. Meena, and Secretary Ministry of Law and Justice (Legislative Department), T.K. Vishwanathan.

A secret note prepared by the Union Ministry of Tribal Welfare for the Committee of Secretaries had said that the rights of the forest dwelling Scheduled tribes, who were inhabiting the forests for generations, had not been adequately recognized resulting in “historical injustice” to these forest Dwellers, who were integral to the very survival and sustainability of the forest eco-system.

It was at a meeting chaired by the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh on January 19, 2005 that it was decided that the Ministry of Tribal Affairs would take steps to formulate a “Scheduled Tribes and Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act” for assertion of the forest dwellers “legal rights” on land. Soon thereafter, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs had constituted a Technical Support Group comprising representatives of the Ministries of Environment and Forests, Panchayati Raj, Rural development, Department of Legal Affairs and Planning Commission as well as six “reputed experts having rich experience and deep association with the cause of environmental protection and welfare of tribal people”.

The note for the Committee of Secretaries said “there exists a spatial relationship between the forest dwelling Scheduled Tribes and the biological resources in the country “and this has also been referred to by the most ancient manuscripts and scriptures that modern humanity knows”. While pointing out that “we continued with colonial legislations and adopted more internationally accepted notions of conservation in our enthusiasm to protect natural resources”, the note went on to add that the reservation process for creating wilderness and forest areas for production forestry somehow went against the bonafide interests of the tribal communities. The note further pointed out that the draft Bill did not envisage the distribution of forest land but only proposed the recognition of every nuclear forest dwelling family’s existing occupation on 2.5 hectare

of land taking the plea that the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Environment and Forests in 1990 for settlement of rights of forest dwelling Scheduled Tribes over forest land had failed to redress this long standing problem.

The Union Ministry of Environment and Forests had earlier objected to the formulation of the Scheduled Tribes (Recognition of Forest Rights) Bill by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs on the ground that the subject “Forests” is allocated to the MoEF under the Government of India (Allocation of Business) Rules, 1961.

Taking a strong posture against the proposed Bill, the MoEF said that the approach adopted in the proposed Bill would lead to irreparable ecological damage of immense proportion. Decimation of forests as a result of enactment of the proposed Act, was also likely to lead to more frequent and intense natural calamities like floods and soil erosion that would adversely be affecting the livelihood of people. The MoEF further said that the enactment of the proposed Bill would also leave an adverse impact on the precious biological diversity, wildlife and the natural resource base for maintenance of carbon, nitrogen and oxygen cycles. While recognising the traditional rights of tribals over their “ancestral domain”, the MoEF said that the Bill was likely to cause more damage, without significant benefit to the tribals in the long run.

The MoEF even went on to emphasize that the Forests are a “national natural resource and hence the whole population of the country enjoys rights over this natural resource either in tangible terms or intangible terms”. Therefore it is the duty of every citizen to protect the forests and environment as per the Directive principles laid down in the Constitution, the MoEF said while taking the stand that the whole issue should be looked at from perspectives of ecological science, equity and overall costs to the entire society.

On the other side, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs that was spearheading the proposed Bill, took the stand that the idea was not to vitiate the mandate of the settlement of rights. It emphasised that the subject of the proposed legislation was not merely forests but forest-tribal interface including rights of tribals existing even before the reservation process under forest laws. The Ministry of Tribal Affairs even proposed to the Prime Minister’s office (PMO) that “all matters concerning Tribal-Forest Interface, including recognition of forest rights of the forest dwelling Scheduled Tribes could be allocated to the Ministry of Tribal Affairs under the Government of India (Allocation of Business) Rules, 1961.

On December 2005, the Union Cabinet approved the legislation to grant tribals the right to forest land and prevent the eviction of those who had encroached on forest land over a long period of time.

A parliamentary committee had earlier made the unanimous recommendation that 2005 be treated as the cut-off year for recognizing the tribals’ right on forest land whereas the Government wanted to fix it as 1980.