DISPLACEMENTS, ATROCITIES AND IMPACT ON LIVELIHOOD AND SURVIVAL WITH RELATION TO FORESTS:

"On July 17, 2003, 10 forest personnel accompanied by 150 members of forest protection committee entered Bhandarpani and looted and burnt the entire hamlet of 10 families. The Korku villagers were left with nothing but clothes on their body. The destruction was complete when on July 20 a team of 3 forest personnel and 50 members of the forest protection committee raided the hamlet again and beat up the villagers sparing not even an eight month old infant. Food, utensils, chicken, goat, money and clothes were carried away by the looting party.

A similar incident occurred on November 1, 2001 when personnel of Madhya Pradesh Forest Development Corporation looted and burnt 30 houses in the Adivasi hamlet of Panvakhedy. The Korku Adivasis survive on mango kernel for most of the year. Wherever they go, they are confronted by the spectre of reserved forest. Their entire habitat falls under the RF, which, interestingly, is the first RF in India, created in 1862. The Korku king Bhabhnot Singh was imprisoned in Jabalpur jail and hanged there. They steal anything they can find. The forest personnel in Khandwa district raid the villages frequently. When they come, villagers run away leaving their belongings behind. The foresters, armed with bags and cans, steal anything they find worthwhile. The officials also chase the fleeing Adivasis. In one case, they picked up a woman in their jeep. When her husband confronted them and ran after the jeep, the forest staff shot at and killed him. The government claimed that it was an accident and post-mortem report was changed to death caused by a sharp instrument. The body was not handed over to the family members."
--Source: "Update Collective", Issue no. 44, Jan-Feb 2004

If you think this is a scene out of Bollywood film of the 70s, then you are miles away from reality. The above is not a stray example of atrocities on Adivasis by forest officials, but a sordid tale of insensitive forest rules, regulations, laws; in the name of so-called development by building dams, mines and evicting Adivasis in the name of preserving the sanctuaries and national parks. Though the Adivasi is the first settler (Adi = first and vasi = settler) of this earth, today the Adivasis are the most neglected, isolated, deprived communities because a group of people have "progressed" at their expense.

The above plight of Adivasis living in forests goes largely unreported by the media. The Adivasis living in the forests are completely at the mercy of the forest guards who overwhelmed with their power and control over the forests isolate and blatantly abuse the life and livelihood of the Adivasis knowing that there is no official other than them to see what's going on.

In this section we provide you few articles, reports which describe some of the atrocities faced by the Adivasis. The irony of it is that in many instances forced displacements appear so called "legal"! Read on to know more of the dynamics and politics involved where the law is ignorant of the Adivasi life, livelihood and survival.

Enslaved People in Free India
Forest officials call it shramdaan (voluntary labour), but for Gond tribals of Baretha it is the price that they must pay on a regular basis to keep their life going. Begar (unpaid labour) may have become illegal in the statue book, but for these forest dwellers time has changed nothing except the term itself.

.........The tribals here own nothing not even their labour. Living constantly under threat both physical and psychological of eviction, they cannot even dream of disobeying the unjust demands, earlier under British regime and now under a government "of the people, by the people and for the people".

Adivasis - the forgotten India
According to one estimate, of the 600,000 people displaced by 421 sanctuaries and 75 national parks, 500,000 are Adivasis. In States such as Karnataka and Kerala, much of the tension between the Government and groups of Adivasis has revolved around the question of displacement caused by these sanctuaries and parks.

Apart from forests, the other development aspect that has been a huge blow to the ability of the Adivasis to continue living in their own environment has been the construction of large dams. Inevitably, the largest number of those displaced are Adivasis because dams are built on rivers that run through the forest areas where they live.

Forced displacement from protected areas: The spectre looms large
Nearly 4 million people in India live inside protected areas and are dependant on their resources for survival. The Ministry of Environment and Forests’ strict enforcement of a 2000 Supreme Court order restricting the collection of natural resources from inside protected areas is likely to have far-reaching consequences, forcing local people out of their traditional homes and creating a conflict between people and conservation

In February 2000, India ’s Supreme Court (SC) passed an order restraining state governments and their agencies from removing dead, dying or wind-fallen trees and grass from any national park or sanctuary in the country. For the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF), however, the order meant something completely different. This is evident in a recently released handbook of theMoEF relating to forest laws: “In view of this (SC order), rights and concessions cannot be enjoyed in the protected areas.” So, while the court wanted to stop the state and its agencies from extracting timber and other such resources from protected areas (PAs), for the government it became a blanket tool to stop all extraction of resources or the exercising of any rights in PAs, even by local people.

Free trade and forest dwelling communities: War between surplus and survival
Forests, the nurturer of thousands of adivasi and other forest workers, are well under the inspection of corporate investors. This is what the principle of open market economy and international trade policies demands. The government along with the forest department has been engaged in dispossessing forest-based communities under the pretext of forest conservation and wildlife protection. On the other hand, it is opened for industrial purpose like mining, power, dams, etc., defence projects, so-called wildlife management, botanical gardens, bio-experiments, eco-tourism and so on.

People’s control over natural resources was further reduced with the direct intervention of International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade Organisation, etc. Several World Bank funded projects have already worsened the condition of the forests and forest-dwelling communities. The major intention was not just to capture the resources from indigenous people, but also to establish an unquestionable political and social control over the world.

For indigenous communities like the adivasi and Dalit, their dependency on land and forest is not just in the form of a productive asset, but also as a symbol of their self-determination, co-existence, community feeling and dignity. Now this has become a tradable commodity.

Massive violations and displacements of Adivasis in the name of forest laws and policies.

JAMBUDWIP, West Bengal (10,000 fisherfolk denied their livelihood)

In this region that is water but also land, October signifies the beginning of a four-month fishing season. And here, this year, more than 10,000 jaila kaibartyas — a south Bengal caste of traditional fisherfolk — wait with hardly concealed desperation to set out to sea. But they won't. They can't. Why?....In November 2002, Wildlife Protection Society of India director Belinda Wright shot off a letter to the Centrally Empowered Committee (CEC; it advises the Supreme Court on all cases related to forestry). The letter complained of 'encroachment' by fisherfolk in mangrove- forested Jambudwip — an island 5 km south of the mainland, CEC issued a letter to the chief secretary, West Bengal, to take action; subsequently, on August 25 2003, SC passed an interim order that "no trawler or mechanised boat shall enter the water adjoining Jambudwip Island until further orders". The problem is fisherfolk use a part of Jambudwip to dry the fish they catch 15 km south, in the sea. What, now, is the point of fishing if the fish can't be dried there? ......

10,000+ South Bengal fisherfolk in a net, not of their making..... To read the full Tehelka report click here

MUTHANGA, Kerala (Adivasis butchered in broad daylight)

The Kerala government enacted the Kerala Scheduled Tribal (Restriction on Transfer of Land and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Act in 1975. It was then announced that the Government would treat all alienated Adivasi lands as "stolen property'' and that the lands would be restored to its rightful owners - the Adivasis. Unfortunately, this law was never implemented in Kerala and as the years rolled by land grabbers in cahoots with politicians, businessmen and corrupt forest officials made attempts to scuttle the law, an attempt was made to dilute the law in 1996 which did not succeed.

In their struggle for land rights many groups mobilised themselves in Kerala in the past two decades. The Kerala govt. in 2002 entered into a pact with C. K. Janu and other Adivasi leaders that all landless Tribal families in the State would get land not exceeding 5 acres. Considerable hope of the Adivasis was raised that they would soon get per family resulting in peaceful homes for themselves with land to live on. Soon they realized that the government was not going to fulfill its commitments in its entirety. To assert their promised rights, over 1000 families entered the Muthanga forest range in January 2003 in small groups with their possessions and settled down there from Jan 4onwards. Their settlement was peaceful, causing no hindrance to the inhabitants of neighbouring localities. They had with them no firearms or other lethal weapons. But the brutality that followed was one of the most infamous atrocities on Adivasis. With state war declared against the Adivasis, police and forest officials severely assaulted women, children and innocent Adivasis and butchered over two dozen of them in broad daylight.

To read a full version on the Muthanga issue click here.
for one more report click here.

MELGHAT, Maharashtra (Displacement = 1,000 Adivasi children dead)

The villages of Koha, Khund and Bohri around Amraviti district in Maharashtra are located on a huge sprawl of swampy land. It is the new, tailor-made habitat for 500-odd Korru adivasis of Melghat. The three villages share one school, one health centre and one anganwadi. A cluster of land plots lie next to each other, assigned to the villagers by the government. There are no trees to feed from, no wood for fuel, just the pain of leaving their land and the lush forests of Chikaldara.

A few months ago, forest officials forced the villagers to relocate from the old villages where they have been living for generations. The old villages, also called Koha, Khund and Bohri, were part of the forest territory assigned for the Tiger Project of Melghat. For the sake of 79 tigers and a few more to be dumped from the urban jungles of Powai, Mumbai, 22 villages have been forced to leave their ancient land. It was a parallel drive launched along with the Tiger Preservation Project that begun in 1972 and has taken off aggressively in 2003-2004 - the same year 1,000 adivasi children died in Melghat.

To read the full report click here.