The Forest Rights Act

The Forest Rights Act: The Ground Situation

Friends,

The struggle for forest rights continues, now with the added strength of an Act (flawed as it is) in our hands.  The implementation process for the Act has now begun in most of the major central Indian States.  Details are given in this mail.

There is a wide variation in how the Act is being implemented, as would be expected with such a complex legislation.  The organisations are now, along with their other struggles, fighting to ensure that the Act is implemented in a just and democratic manner reflecting its spirit.  As all expected though such things do not come easily; and in many instances there are conscious efforts to undermine the Act through sabotage, haste or simply illegal measures.   One of these measures, the Ministry of Environment and Forests' efforts to spread false propaganda that rights would not be recognised in tiger habitats, preceded the Act itself.  Other types of sabotage are taking place under the State governments, for instance in Chhattisgarh.  

In most cases the sabotages are proceeding on expected lines, in precisely the areas where the movements had pointed out flaws in the Act and the Rules - on the fact that the requirement that people "primarily reside in the forest" can be used to exclude most forest dwellers; on the failure of the Rules to require that gram sabhas should be convened at the level of actual settlements instead of the gram panchayat; on the hurdle of ST certificates; and so on.

But the most politically crucial aspect of this Act is already evident: the empowerment of the gram sabha as the democratic body for determining rights.  What is showing on the ground is that, even where awareness is low and information just percolating through, people are beginning to fight back.  There are ongoing efforts to reduce rights recognition once again to forest guards and surveyors (the same settlement systems of previous forest laws), as we expected there would be.  But the government is facing growing resistance.   The political space created by this Act and its procedures are already proving to be potent weapons.

Meanwhile, as has now been reported in the press, some of the hardline conservationists, having failed to completely subvert the democratic process, are now attempting to use the courts against the struggle.  We will be sending out a statement on the situation shortly.

Campaign for Survival and Dignity