Indian Tribals

Tripura to hold fresh exam for vacant SC/ST seats in MBBS

2011-09-11T23:17:00.001-07:00

Agartala, Sep 12 : The Tripura Government has decided to conduct another exam under Tripura Joint Entrance Board (TJEB) to fill up 29 seats in reserved categories, including 25 ST seats, which had been left vacant in AGMC this year because of non-availability of qualified students.

After several rounds of discussion at an all-party meeting yesterday, higher education department announced that TBJEE would conduct a fresh examination for ST/SC students to fill up the vacancies.

In the all-party meeting, opposition Congress had raised strong demands of reviewing all answer scripts of medical joint entrance examination while the state government gave opinion in favour of re-examining all the candidates.

Both Chief Minister Manik Sarkar and Health Minister Tapan Chakraborty had written separate letters to Union Health Minister Ghulam Navi Azad and the Medical Council of India (MCI) requesting to reduce the cut-off marks from the prescribed 40 in state joint entrance exam for SC and ST students.

Replying to chief minister’s letter, Azad on August 8 clearly stated that the issue involved two aspects--teaching and treatment and the professionals would be dealing with living human beings, so, diluting qualifying criteria was neither feasible nor desirable.

He said two separate writ petitions were filed in Guahati High Court's Agartala bench demanded filling up of reserved medical seats by reducing cut-off mark.

The bench rejected the plea for reduction of cut-off marks prescribed by the MCI for reserved categories for getting admission in MBBS last month.

An identity crisis for tribal communities

2011-04-18T09:12:00.000-07:00

By Baljeet Kumar

New Delhi, April 18 : Today, there are several regions, many of them forested and inhabited by the tribal communities, which have become flash-points of violence where Naxalism has taken root.

It is undoubtedly one of the gravest challenges facing the country. Contemporary political understanding has moved beyond viewing the phenomenon as a security or merely a law and order situation.

There is an acknowledgement, that development processes either bypassed these tribal regions or were severely compromised over the decades. The neglect of these regions and the impoverishment of its people has been widely perceived to be a fundamental cause pushing them towards Naxalism.

In its broad strategy to rid these regions of the 'Naxal menace', the Government has adopted as one of its core principles the restoration of the development process in these 'regions of conflict'; to open up the tribal communities to opportunities, which they have remained excluded from and bring benefit on the ground.

We are then at an intersection of legacy of neglected development in tribal regions, the rise of Naxalism and now the government's move meet the challenge head on. The strategy clearly has been to flush out the Naxals from the rural hinterland using force and quickly apply the balm of development to the areas affected.

It is at this intersection that the tribal community or the Adivasi stands today. What are the needs on the ground, how have they been addressed or not addressed and how can development agendas now become inclusive and integrate their interests with the rest of the 'mainstream society? The answers to some of the fundamental questions of our larger polity and society lie in this, addressing the concerns of the adivasis.

On the face of it, it seems like a clear-cut policy line, but is it really that easy? Who actually are these adivasis? Here, we are not talking about their social, cultural, linguistic, ethnic entity, which in a sense defines their identity. We need to get beyond that to see how they are defined or categorised for the purpose of targeted development within the political system, their 'political identity' as it were.

Do we have a methodology in place to identify them on the basis of certain characteristics? Is there a nationally accepted yardstick to know who falls in this category and how they can be distinguished from other communities, who inhabit the same region?

The government parlance is 'ST', an interchangeable and official term that implies this distinct group. Yet do we know what this term 'ST' which is used commonly means? What are its parameters or its defining features? Only if we are clear, could we move ahead to assess the present policies, their impact on 'regions of conflict' and attempt to broaden or improve them.

This is the first point of ambiguity. Article 342 section (1) of the Constitution enjoins upon the President of India, in consultation with the Governor of a state to notify SC or ST communities. Article 366(2) of the Constitution of India refers to Scheduled Tribes as communities who are "scheduled" in accordance with Article 342 through a declaration by the President of India.

The 'Adivasi' then remains just a term, which according to the discretion of the President finds a 'fit' with a particular community living in specific areas, which the Constitution recognizes as "Scheduled Areas". There is no uniformity or a set of features or conditions, which they need to fulfill to categorize them as such.

Surely, this is an unacceptable situation considering the fate of 11 crore Adivasis in this country, constituting 6.2 per cent of the total population according to the 2001 Census hangs in balance. The process can be defined as 'discretionary' at best and 'random' at worst. This shows up as gross irregularities on the ground.

Thus, the Santhals living in Assam do not have access to benefits due to Scheduled Tribes, which are accorded to Santhals in Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal. Several tribal groups like Gonds, Pahari Korbas, Kanwar, Junawar spread in states like Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Jharkhand are covered under different gradations of Central Government. This arises again from difference in their definition status.

In the Central Government's records, the term is equally vague. There is no concrete definition, which means that Government policy for inclusion and upliftment of tribal populations is built on shifting sands. If the very definition is arbitrary, the entire process following it would be flawed. Massive sections of those, who are actually adivasis may not figure at all. This non- commitment to a set of standards in defining tribals is reflected at international levels too.

The ILO Convention No.169 adopted in 1989 refers to tribal peoples in independent countries whose social, cultural and economic conditions clearly distinguish them from other sections of national communities. Their status is regulated wholly or partially by customs or traditions handed down the ages or by special laws or regulations.

Interestingly, India was one of the first nations to ratify the precursor to Convention 169, the ILO Convention no 107 in Sept 1958 but has not ratified the present one.

The catch is that all of this falls within the 'objective criteria', a parameter not sufficient to declare a people' tribal' or 'indigenous'. The 'subjective criteria' hinges on a process of 'self identification' of these groups. Thus self-identification is supposed to compliment the objective criteria and vice-versa. Across countries, this ambiguity has left policy makers sans the required level of information on the communities whose concerns they are meant to address. Monitoring the effects of state interventions also gets jeopardized.

The Lokur Committee set up in 1965 to revise the lists of SC's and ST's in the country defined the characteristics of the ST's. Several communities living in forested regions in our country, who are seen to be fulfilling these norms, are excluded from the official tag of ST's.

They face the biggest loss, excluded from a plethora of development programs devised keeping in mind communities with their particular characteristics. The extent of this exclusion is mammoth. The present categorization covers only 8.5 crore, out of 11 crore are Adivasis today. It is in some of these regions in India, amongst these hapless people, that the Naxals have their stronghold.

According to Charkha Development Communications, the government's approach to development in tribal regions, need urgent identification and correction. The ongoing violence, loss of lives, property, livelihoods and security has been too heavy a price to pay for this ambiguity at the highest level.

Migrating to distant lands for a job

2011-04-10T21:14:00.001-07:00

K. Venkateshwarlu

Goal of rural job scheme eludes Chenchu tribals

-PHOTO: K. VENKATESWARLU

Struggle for survival: Udathanuri Parvatalu, who was among the group of Chenchus who went all the way to Meghalaya in search of work, at Vadde Rayavaram in Mahbubnagar district. VADDERAYARAM (Mahabubnagar dt): For a morsel, primitive Chenchu tribes of this ‘gudem' (habitation) again gear up to migrate to distant Meghalaya for work, a paradox in a State that boasts of creating the maximum number of person days under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme.
Criss- crossing undulating Nallamala forest for long distances is a life skill learnt early by these fleet-footed tribals. Yet they dread travelling 1,700 km to Meghalaya as it often means facing death and working as bonded labour in abominable conditions for a paltry wage. But with water sources drying up, dwindling forest produce, fragmented farms not yielding much and finding work to feed themselves turning a daily challenge, they hardly have a choice.
They have to take the arduous journey despite the MGNREGA's express purpose of checking such migration from drought prone areas by providing wage employment for all in their own ‘gudem' or village. Five years since the programme was launched, the goal continues to elude Chenchus.
“Last month we got work for eight days and this month there is no sign of any work so far. How will we survive? We are scared of going to Meghalaya as every time we go there at least two or three of our community people die. We are treated worst than animals. But if things do not improve here in the next few days we have to pack up and go” says Udathanuru Parvathalu.
There fear is not unfounded. The saga of deaths began at the site of a power plant near Shillong with Katraju Laxmi of Marredmandinne in February 2006, around the time NREGA was launched. She was among 600 Chenchu bonded labourers who were literally carted away to Shillong by a labour contractor on a paltry advance of Rs. 1,000.
Like other Chenchu women, Laxmi found the wage hardly sufficient. Hard labour with no proper food made her vulnerable to disease and she died. Her death sparked off protests and one of them was staged at India Gate in New Delhi and the then Rajya Sabha member, R. Chandrasekhara Reddy, highlighted their plight in the Upper House. Petitions were sent to National Human Rights Commission and the Prime Minister and the State Chief Minister. Parvathalu says at least six Chenchus met the same fate during the last five years. After the furore, they indeed got wage employment but not enough to rule out migration. The only thing that has changed during these years is increase in advance for bonded labour from Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 5000.

Some self-help - and tribal women mean business

2011-04-06T05:38:00.000-07:00

Banswara: They set out to work in their `offices`, dabble in numbers with ease and bring home more money than their husbands. The fact that they are illiterate tribal women in obscure Rajasthan villages does not dampen their shimmering entrepreneurial dreams.
It all started with the coming together of some women who formed self-help groups (SHGs). Now the self-help movement is an over 1,000- strong army with a presence in 24 villages in Banswara district`s Sednani area.

These women sell seeds, own poultry businesses, make incense sticks and beauty products, besides doing conventional sewing and stitching activities. They gather at `chaupals` to hold meetings.

After being subservient to their husbands and lending a helping hand in labour work all their lives, these women in Banswara district are breaking the glass ceiling and ushering in prosperity in the area.

"Some NGOs working for tribal women`s development had called a meeting here to float the idea of self-help groups a few months ago. But when our families came to know that women will go out and be involved in earning money, they protested," Rampyari Devi, a woman associated with SHG Navjyoti, told IANS.

The first meeting was attended by the women`s family members.

"Somehow, the men were convinced. After that, like a revolution, women started joining self-help groups," she added. The group has set up poultry farms and supply chicken products.
These groups are democratically formed and elect their own leaders. The modus operandi is that women pool in their small savings, and then use it among themselves.

Another woman, Likhma Devi, says, "The women are now earning about Rs.6,000-7,000 every month, which in most cases is more than what men in the area earn."

She says about 80 women have so far gone to state capital Jaipur to acquire training in various fields. Different government departments and NGOs are providing training to these SHGs.

Rampyari, who is part of an SHG, said with money coming in, the lifestyle of villagers has started to change.

"Earlier things like television sets were available in very few houses...now a lot of houses in my village have TVs and that too with satellite receivers," she added with pride.

The migration of tribal families from the area has also stopped due to their improved standard of living.

"Earlier, tribal families had to migrate to other parts of the state and nearby states like Gujarat for a particular period every year. But this has stopped now, due to which children are getting steady education," said Sukanya Joshi, an NGO worker.

Likhma Devi echoes similar views. "My life has changed...I am illiterate but after I started to earn money I started sending my children to school," she said.

There are 21 SHGs in the district, some 550 km from Jaipur. The groups have been named after female deities of Hindu religion like Parvati and Saraswati and Bharatmata.

"The tribal women, most of them illiterate, run them like corporate houses. They have learnt skills, including auditing and accounting required for running the business. Most of the products are sold in urban or semi-urban areas besides for local consumption," Joshi added.

All-India Adivasi Mahasabha calls for unity among tribals

2011-03-29T03:19:00.001-07:00

Smita Gupta

‘In democracy, solution must come from peaceful exercise of people's power'
“Creamy layer” in tribal community must help fight poverty and illiteracy

New Delhi: The All-India Adivasi Mahasabha, on the first day of its three-day long conference here on Monday at the Talkatora Indoor Stadium, stressed the need to unite the diverse tribal communities from across the country to gain a voice in Delhi, as a starting point to controlling their own destinies – and their land, water and forests.
In his speech, Meghalaya Governor R.S. Moosahary told delegates: “Let us unite all tribal groups so that we can compete – this is a competitive world.” Calling on the “creamy layer” in the tribal community to understand the aspirations of those less fortunate, he asked them to help fight poverty and illiteracy.
Appeal to Maoists
Criticising the government, Mr. Moosahary said poor administration and corruption in parts of the country had created Maoism. Making an appeal to the Maoists, he said, “You may be fighting for a good cause but you cannot get anywhere by killing innocents. In a democracy, the solution must come from the peaceful exercise of people's power – look at the example of Egypt.” Referring to the Indian Constitution, he said, “The Indian Constitution is a flexible document – short of Independence, you can get virtually anything.”
The national conference is being jointly organised by the Indian Confederation of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples (ICITP), an umbrella organisation overseeing over 310 issue-based tribal communities' organisations along with various other tribal forums. The meeting hopes to exert pressure on the government to properly implement laws such as Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas (PESA) Act, the Forest Rights Act and other pro- tribal laws, as well as strategise to address emerging challenges for the tribal communities as well as to protect tribal cultural identities.
Issues
The conference will focus on issues related to land laws and land alienation, development induced displacement, forest and encroachment and eviction, extremism in Adivasi areas, poverty and migration, among others. It also plans to look at the different laws enacted in the country for the welfare of the tribals and decide how to take advantage of laws such as the Right to Information (RTI), PESA and the FRA.

Allocation of loans for SC/ST students hiked manifold: Govt

2011-03-24T23:35:00.001-07:00

Government has said it had increased allocation of loans for SC/ST scholarships manifold and was aiming to provide the benefit to 40 lakh pre-metric students from this category.

Speaking in the Lok Sabha on a discussion to the answer given by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on 11th March, his deputy Namo Narain Meena said the education loans to SC/ST students was Rs 273 crore in 2003-04 but stood at Rs 2,252 crore in 2009-10.

He said the percentage of SC/ST students covered under the loans from this category was 17.69 percent of their population.

For loans to SC/ST on agri-business, a special cell has been established in public sector banks, the Minister of State for Finance said on Thursday.

Opposition members, especially those from the BJP, countered the claims made by Meena, saying these provisions were already there and the main issue was their proper implementation. They claimed no cells had been established in banks for SC/ST.

Jyoti Dhurve (BJP), who had asked for the half-hour discussion on Mukherjee's reply, raised some important points during her presentation.

"The SC and ST have are not getting dues. What is the reason behind the poor development of these communities despite spending a lot of money by the government. I think that they have not got their due," she said.

Dhurve also talked about the unaffordable education finance which is hampering the growth of downtrodden in the country and pointed out that the rate of interest on such loans is as high 11 percent.

She demanded cheaper education loans for the SC and ST students.

Shailendra Kumar (SP) said the enumeration of SC/ST population has till now not been done properly, as a result of which the real number of those living below the poverty line is not known.

He said provisions should be made for giving reservations to SC/ST in private sector as well.

Arjun Meghwal (BJP) said the government should find out how many banks have not met their target of providing loans to SC/ST under its DRI scheme.

He insisted that government should provide for coaching classes for SC/ST students.

Paramjeet Kaur Gulshan (SAD) said the minister's answer was way off the mark and sought to know who are the beneficiaries of the government schemes for SC/ST.

She complained that the loan never reaches the intended beneficiaries at the ground level.

Avalanche threat in tribal areas of Himachal

2011-02-07T06:58:00.001-08:00

Shimla, Feb 7 (PTI) Avalanche threat today loomed large over tribal Lahaul and Pangi Valleys in Himachal Pradesh as intermittent heavy snowfall disrupted normal life affecting water, power supply and vehicular movement.

Acting Deputy Commissioner, Lahaul and Spiti, Varinder Sharma has advised people not to venture out in view of the avalanche threat and ordered closures of all schools in the Valley tomorrow.

Keylong, headquarter of the district, recorded over 50 cm of fresh snow and snowfall was continuing, reports reaching here said. Heavy snowfall was continuing in the high altitude tribal areas, mountain passes.

The ski slopes at Solang nallah are experiencing fresh snow, while key tourist resort of Manali had another spell of moderate snowfall.

Shimla and other mid-hills were lashed by a severe thunderstorm accompanied by intermittent heavy rains while tribal areas were experiencing fresh snowfall.

Growing Naxalism: A stigma on face of 'shining' India

2010-12-07T00:56:00.001-08:00

Recently, Indian Minister for Home Affairs Ajay Maken made a starling revelation before the Lok Sabha that more than 577 people including security personnel and civilians were massacred during Naxal attacks this year till October 31. At least 1,850 incidents of violence reported in the country’s Maoist-hit areas, this year yet. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had already declared the Naxal problem as the most serious security threat to New Delhi than Northeast insurgency.
Naxal movement is gaining momentum with every passing day. It has spread its tentacles to 200 districts of India. The question arises why the Naxals have been able to expand their area of influence and operations over the years to become a serious threat to the India’s internal security. This is due to multiple factors. The failure of the administration to make sure that the benefits of development percolate down to the common man, especially tribals should be considered as the main factor. The Naxal infested states have large tribal populations with poor infrastructure.
According to India’s Shankar Aiyar, “Each of the 80 worst Naxal-affected districts has no schools, poor heath care, exploitative feudalism, no employment opportunities and pathetic social infrastructure.” Over 0.3 million villages have no road connectivity.
As a case in point, Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh is on the list of 100 worst-affected districts for the past two decades. Corruption, displacement due to large scale projects, inability to avail of benefits from mining of mineral resources, and exploitation by local officials are enough to multiply resentment and increase reception to Naxal ideology.
Another factor is that Naxals have become more organised rather than a scattered force. Naxals model themselves on the Indian army, from training manuals to undercover training. The manuals translated into Hindi from Telugu by the security forces give a chilling insight into People’s Liberation Guerilla Army (PLGA) planning military skills and motives. This is very similar to the training of a Jawan or even a JCO.
The PLGA’s basic military courses begin with handling automatic weapons, compass and map reading, defensive and attack formations. The manual analyses Naxal operations since 1997 and suggests means to increase enemy casualty.

It discusses how to collect intelligence, stalk the enemy, and lay an ambush and attack. It also instructs how to retreat when attacked, regroup later using coded communication and how to raid protection installations.
The fighting forces of Naxals are divided into three categories. The primary force is of extremely well-trained personnel who spearhead any attack with superior weapons. The secondary force forms the bulk of a large group with less sophisticated weapons. Finally, the people’s militia comprises on poor farmers, labourers and such other people.
Naxals have over 80 training camps, each training between 200 to 300 people at any point. There are 84 training camps which are operating in several states such as Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Jharkhand.
In such circumstances supporting Naxals is far better option for the locals. 200 out of 600 districts are under Naxalite rule. They rule there because the people in these places support them in a majority and believe in them because the Naxals give them food, money and land, snatched from the rich land owners. To the people against whom they fight are villains and terrorists but the people for whom they fight are the heroes.
Indian government cannot stop the growth of Naxals through police, Salwa Judum or the military. It can only do so by erasing the reasons of Naxal movement. The Naxal belt is trapped in a vicious cycle of underdevelopment and violence. The foot soldiers of the movement believe that the Naxal movement will bring about development and prosperity. So the government can reduce people’s appeal for the movement by providing opportunities to the people of Naxal belt through sound economic and infrastructural development programmes. Despite well aware of the reasons that are behind the rise of Naxalism, Indian government is only depending upon force to end that problem.
At a time when India is a desperate aspirant for the United Nations Security Council permanent seat, it must look towards Naxals and uprisings in other northeastern states, and clean the stigma of Naxalism from its face.

‘The Chittagong Hill Tracts: A Victim of Indian Intervention’: Book Review

2010-12-06T01:46:00.001-08:00

: Flag of the Chittagong Hill Tracts

Book Review : ‘The Chittagong Hill Tracts: A Victim of Indian Intervention’ A K Zaman
akz5153@gmail.com

Zainal Abedin in his informative and research-based book has reflected the problem of insurgency in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh from multi-dimensional points of view. A number of books on CHT issue are available in the realm of publication, but this book makes a distinctive and analytical approach to rethink about the long-term desire and interest of some vested quarters at home and abroad.
The writer has highlighted all the issues relating to CHT, geo-political importance and economic potentials of CHT in this region, the origin of migrated tribals and settlers in CHT. The premise narrated in the book are :

CHT is a part and parcel of Bangladesh from time immemorial and the tribal people migrated to CHT from adjoining areas of India and Myanmar .
The Bengalis have been the original inhabitants in CHT even before British rule in this region .
India plotted conspiracy to destabilize and hinder economic upliftment of Bangladesh by floating guerrilla war in CHT instigating the tribal secessionists.
Only a section of Chakma tribals is involved with the insurgency and majority of resident tribals are against this secessionist group.
During Pakistan rule tribal community never claimed regional autonomy of CHT.
The peace treaty is suicidal and detrimental to the interest of the country.
The withdrawal of army from CHT area will give the secessionists a opportunity for strengthening their position.

The writer has elaborately ventilated root causes of the crisis of CHT, but he exerted little on the measures to resolve the problem. However, this book is undoubtedly a research-oriented document which contain valuable information about CHT. It may be mentioned that even the educated section of our country is quite ignorant of prolonged crisis of CHT and sinister design of India behind it. This book will be a great help to create awareness of the people in home and abroad about the deep conspiracy of India and its stooges against Bangladesh. The writer has categorically illustrated that the tribals of different communities living in CHT area are neither original dwellers nor aborigines as they try to claim. From historical and anthropological perspective he proved that they migrated from adjoining areas of China, Myanmar and India , particularly from her North-Eastern region. Their physical stature, dialect, life-style and cultural identity indicate that they are outsiders who settled in CHT. History also reflects that the Chakma headmen were under the control of the Muslim rulers. But the tribals particularly the Chakmas intentionally try to misinterpret the concept ‘aborigines’ to draw sympathetic attention from native and overseas communities to achieve their ill interest. It may be mentioned here that a section of electronic and print media, intellectuals, journalists and politicians also echo the same sentiment and express solidarity with the tribal leaders to gain narrow political advantage.
The writer has rightly pointed out the common interest and malicious anti-army propaganda made by Jana Sanghati Samity (JSS) and India. Both the parties are also in favour of total implementation of so-called peace accord. They demand withdrawal of army from CHT region to ensure their hidden agenda. Besides, Indian newsmen, media and intellectuals also share identical views in this regard. But it is very mysterious that India herself has not yet signed similar agreements with the insurgent groups of North-East or Kashmir. India is unabatedly committing large-scale atrocities and violence and enacted various draconian laws like TADA, Armed Forces Special Power Act, POTA etc to validate their heinous activities in insurgency-ridden areas for a long time. Besides, India has not withdrawn its troops and other security agencies from the concerned troubled areas. But India prescribes totally opposite formula for Bangladesh.
The writer has indicated that Indian North-East region bordering CHT is geo-politically and strategically very important and volatile. Besides, this region is also rich in natural and mineral resources. In fact, CHT area is also considered as sensitive and strategically significant from Indian defence and security point of view. The writer truly reflected the intervention and involvement of India in order to destabilize the CHT region to help her to subdue insurgency in one hand and to get direct access to North-East region. On the other hand this will also enable her to contain China.
The writer has pin-pointed that India uses the Chakma insurgents to keep constant pressure on Bangladesh and weaken it slowly and swallow it finally. He has precisely asserted that by doing this India will be able to intrude its own citizens through ‘push-in’ in CHT area from its North-East region. The writer has cautioned about the pernicious tendency of India. He showed arguments that where India herself has been ruthlessly suppressing and torturing the innocent tribal people of North-East and Kashmir with a view to occupying their lands. The writer has also proved that the implicit presence of India trained insurgents in CHT area will simultaneously jeopardize the interest of the Bengalis as well as the tribals of CHT.
As a result, India will be able to project Bangladesh as a violator of human rights and international pressure will increase which will help India to dominate over Bangladesh. The writer in his book projected India ‘s presence of army in different insurgency-prone areas where human rights violation is rampant and atrocities committed by India go beyond description. India makes tall talks and shed crocodiles’ tears about human rights, democracy of other countries but such type of norms are not followed by India herself. It may be mentioned that military crackdown on unarmed minority and civilians in North-East India and Kashmir is not properly reflected in Indian media.
The writer has also clearly reflected the impracticability, non-transparency, and duplicity of various clauses of the peace treaty which needs to be reviewed and amended for greater national interest. Some clauses incorporated in the treaties are directly against the majority people of the land and contradicts the basic premise of the constitution.

‘The Chittagong Hill Tracts: A Victim of Indian Intervention’
By Mohammad Zainal Abedin, Published by Eastern Publications
16 Silvester House, London EI 2JD, February 2003, ISBN 984-32-0513-2
Pages: 238 A K Zaman, akz5153@gmail.com

Posted by Isha Khan, who can be reached at bdmailer@gmail.com

Need for documenting traditional food systems of tribals: FAO

2010-12-01T03:14:00.000-08:00

Puducherry, Dec 1 (PTI) There is a need for documentation of traditional food systems of the tribal population to "retain" and "protect" them in a number of countries and this is "never more so" than in India, an FAO official said here today.

"There is a clear imperative to protect traditional food systems, local food resources and their biodiversity in a number of countries and this is never more so than in India," Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) representative in India, Gavin Linday Wall said at a conference here.

This would also provide evidence of successful food-based interventions that are improving the well-being and health of tribal people in India, Wall said.

He was speaking at the three-day international conference on ''Traditional Foods'', which was inaugurated by Puducherry Lt Governor Iqbal Singh.

The FAO official said there were 84.3 million tribal people in the country representing over 300 languages and cultures.

Each traditional food system might contain up to 250 species of traditional food alone as well as additional bio-resources for medicines. This knowledge base is a treasure worthy of national attention and protection, he said.

"The very nature of a programme to achieve these improvements means that it focusses on women and children who often have the worst indicators of nutritional status," Wall said.

The FAO has been undertaking preparatory work on traditional foods in Himachal Pradesh which had shown keen interest in promoting Indian systems of medicine, especially Ayurveda.

He said gaps in knowledge regarding the nutrition and health of tribal people should be identified and a plan of action for both research and interventions would be needed to to inform and enrich policy and its implementation.

The country''s traditional foods have inherent safety mechanisms, Iqbal Singh said.

Chief Minister V Vaithilingam said Puducherry government would encourage investors in food processing industry from within and outside the country.

Illiteracy main cause of backwardness of ST/SCs: Sociologist

2010-11-27T21:24:00.001-08:00

Morigaon (Assam): Eminent sociologist TG Jogdamb today said that illiteracy was the main cause of backwardness of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in India.

"Successive governments have taken several populist measures to uplift the Scheduled Castes and Tribes in the country but illiteracy remains the main cause for their backwardness", Jogdamb said while delivering the key-note address of an UGC National seminar on 'Scheduled Caste in India dimension of their socio-economic mobility, inequality and discrimination'.

Emancipation of Dalit, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Castes (OBCs) should not be just a political slogan but should be earnestly implemented by the authorities by primarily focussing on eradication of illiteracy, he said.

"Dr Ambedkar has emphasized on education among all sections of people in free India's constitution", he added.

'Development is the only answer to tackling Naxalism'

2010-11-27T20:52:00.001-08:00

The right approach to tackling Naxalism can be illustrated by this incident at Lohri, where a few months ago a carnage had taken place when the Naxalites attacked a police party. We decided to hold a social security awareness campaign in the villages. But the Naxalites sent out warnings against it and closed the main road to traffic.

The tehsildar and his team could not make it to the campaign function. When I asked him about it, the tehsildar replied, "Sir, I tried to come. But the Naxalites had put a huge tree across the road. I moved it aside, my vehicle passed and then I moved the tree back across the road and returned home."

The question is not whether lack of development has given rise to Naxalism or Naxalism has given rise to lack of development. Why are 13- and 14-yearold tribals picking up SLRs and INSAS rifles? Because they get paid Rs 1,500 and get food and clothing. They don't even know who Mao is. It is the fire in the belly that drives them to arms. Naxalism is directly proportional to the forest area. And inversely proportional to the urbanized area. On a much broader scale, we do need to ask the question as to whether the administration and the political executive have delivered on the development model adopted.

Rambling thinking with respect to development, and disjointed or poor development have fuelled Naxalism. There have been discrepancies, mismatches and neglect of vital aspects of development while drawing up development plans in regions. The gap of inequality has been widening between the tribal havenots and others. The problem has nothing to do with ideology. Nandurbar, Amravati, Gondia and Thane are tribal districts. Between 1993 and 1998, Melghat region in Amravati district came into the limelight because of malnutrition-related deaths of tribal infants. Why is Naxalism not thriving there?

Today, Naxalism is taking a totally different path. Rather than talking about the oppressed, the Naxalites are talking about overthrowing the state. The line between the oppressed and the oppressor are very hard to differentiate. For the Naxalites, Gadchiroli comes in the path of their so-called march towards New Delhi in their bid to capture power there in 2030. Gadchiroli lies in the "Red Corridor" between Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. The government has now agreed to procure modern weapons and equipment to tackle the Naxalite menace.

But development is the only answer. We cannot overnight attain the level of progress of the US. We can attain it slowly. The problems are many. The Human Development Index (HDI) is the lowest in intra-State terms. Agriculture is non sustainable. The monetary benefits of government schemes cannot reach the tribals as the banking network is not that widespread in the district. As many as 720 tribal villages are not covered by the mobile network.

Today, Naxalism is taking a totally different path. Rather than talking about the oppressed, the Naxalites are talking about overthrowing the state.

The tribals here are so poor that they cannot even afford to pay for the subsidized health, electricity, housing and food schemes of the government. One tribal development officer based at divisional headquarters in Nagpur looked after five districts in the State. So the additional District Collector is now Member Secretary of the district-level committee to monitor implementation of development work.

After taking over as District Collector, I advocated the need for convergence of the Forest Rights Act, 2006, and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). Under the provisions of the Forest Act, tribals were being denied the right to sell even minor forest produce. I allowed them to sell it in the open market.

Seventy-eight per cent of the district's economy is forest-related. Those whose lives are dependent on the forests should be made essential partners in natural resource planning, conservation and protection. Only then can we overcome the problem of Naxalism.With the help of the agriculture department, we have implemented a tree plantation programme under which the tribals are being given saplings free. They also get ownership rights.

After the first three years, they can sell the produce in the open market. I have also advocated allowing Women's Self Help Groups (SHGs) as units in MGNREGS. Land has always been at the centre of the concept of development. I have tried to move this centre of development away from the district headquarters to the remote and border areas of the district.

There have been problems of connectivity and trained technical manpower. Just the other day the Naxalites burnt one of our vehicles engaged in GPS mapping. To ameliorate the conditions that the tribals live in, I have begun implementation of the e-Health, e-Disha and e-Vidya schemes. Project Dhannankur is aimed primarily at tackling Naxalism head-on.

In remote tribal villages, especially during the monsoons, speedy access to health services was a problem. We have placed ambulances at strategic places so that minimum time is lost in rendering medical aid to the tribals.

Why are the 13- and 14-year-old tribals picking up SLRs and INSAS rifles? Because they get paid Rs 1,500 and get food and clothing.

For this we have come up with a smart card that allows us to keep track online of the health of tribals. Under Project Kayakalp we aim to provide health services with a more human touch. The government has also enhanced the powers of the Divisional and Assistant Conservator of Forests to sanction development work for tribals.

During my decade-long bureaucratic career, I have had the chance to turn around several things. The other day, my presentation on the multi-pronged action plan of development for tackling Naxalism was well received at the meeting of the State Cabinet, chaired by Chief Minister Ashokrao Chavan. The Cabinet has given a green signal to proposals to modernize the local police force for tackling Naxalism.

As Managing Director of the State Minerals and Mining Corporation, Nagpur, I managed to turn the loss-making entity into a profit-making corporation in 2008. The corporation earned a profit of Rs 100 crore then, now it proudly owns captive coal mines in other States and has even begun exporting minerals.

During the 2009 Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, several of the initiatives that we took in managing the polls were appreciated. We adopted an election management plan which was based on randomization. We categorized election staff on the basis of their age and then assigned them duties, gave time slots for polling parties to reach the polling stations, conduct the elections and report back in a sort of relay mechanism.

For the first time, the polling parties could stay overnight in the cloakroom of a nearby railway station. Many of our other initiatives regarding election funding and such matters have been adopted by the Election Commission of India in these Bihar Assembly elections.

The Chief Election Commissioner, Dr. S.Y. Quraishi, made special mention of our innovative methods in election management at the EC's regional conference recently in Goa. Handling such a sensitive and challenging assignment comes with strings attached. Being the District Collector of Gadchiroli, I have to live with Z Plus security cover. (Courtesy: gfiles) (ANI)

Tribals in India suffer due to social exclusion

2010-11-20T03:52:00.001-08:00

New Delhi, Nov 20 (ANI): Vice President Mohammad Hamid Ansari on Friday said that tribal population of India is around 70 million and most of them suffer from geographical and social exclusion, high poverty rates and lack of access to appropriate administrative and judicial mechanisms.

Addressing the "Eighth India Today Chief Ministers Conclave" here today, he said: "These citizens score the lowest in the Human Development Index when compared to other population groups."

He said that low level of infrastructural endowments and growing gap in infrastructure creation in tribal areas, as compared to the rest of India, has further diminished prospects for progress.

The Vice President also said that across the nation gigantic industrial, power, irrigation and mining projects representing the current development paradigm have caused Adivasi protests against land acquisition and displacement.

"An equitable solution to this has to be found. Inclusive growth necessitates aligning our development needs with Adivasi rights and enhancing their Human Development Index," he added.

He further said over 80 per cent of the Scheduled Tribes population works in the primary sector, with 45 per cent of them being cultivators and 37 per cent being agricultural labourers.

"The alienation of tribal land is the single most important cause of pauperisation of tribals, rendering their vulnerable economic situation more precarious. This is sought to be reversed by the Forest Rights Act of 2006," he added.

He said in comparison to other disadvantaged communities and groups, the Adivasis have been less effective in constituting themselves as a Pan-Indian interest group and in articulating their grievances through the formal political system.

"Besides being Scheduled Tribes, many of the Adivasis are also religious and linguistic minorities. It is therefore essential that the protections afforded by the Constitution to the religious and linguistic minorities be fully made available to tribal communities that qualify," he added.

He further hoped that the deliberations of this Conclave would lead to a better understanding of the issues involved and, hopefully, better implementation of the constitutional and legislative provisions for the safeguard of the rights of tribal. (ANI)

Maoist violence, poverty mar growth in decade-old Chhattisgarh

2010-11-17T03:31:00.001-08:00

Raipur, In 10 years of existence, Chhattisgarh has become a study in contrasts. While the state recorded a high growth rate at 11.49 percent, people contest claims of development by citing the fast spreading Maoist insurgency, lack of healthcare and poverty.

A state of 20.08 million people today, Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh Nov 1, 2000, to bring prosperity to the neglected region, particularly the tribals.

'Chhattisgarh is a fast developing state, it has left two others - Jharkhand and Uttarakhand - far behind in terms of development though they were formed at the same time,' said Brijmohan Agrawal, a senior minister in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government of Chief Minister Raman Singh.

The BJP has ruled the state since December 2003.

'We are a zero power cut state, have the country's best public distribution system (PDS) and are making rapid progress in all sectors, be it road or health. No one can dispute this,' Agrawal told IANS.

But people say the quality of life has taken a beating, including that of tribals and Dalits who constitute respectively 32 percent and 12 percent of the population, due to corruption in infrastructure and welfare projects and increasing Maoist insurgency.

'Nothing has changed in the life of poor people; corruption at every stage is depriving us of the benefits of key schemes,' said Mangru, a 52-year-old rickshaw puller in capital Raipur.

'If I have to get a job card under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), I have to pay cash to officials and if I manage to get enrolled, I have to pay the contractor to get the daily wages deposited in my account.

'Poor people can't afford to pay money at every stage; we are probably born to be victimised,' he rued.

While 45 percent of people live below the poverty line, over 70 percent are dependent on the PDS. In 2000, the number of poor families was 1.87 million. This figure has now surged to 3.62 million.

This despite per capita income increasing from Rs.12,170 in 2001-02 to Rs.38,534 (advance estimates) in 2009-10.

The Congress is quick to seize upon the irony.

'There may be a development boom in Chhattisgarh but it is restricted only to a handful of businessmen, traders, bureaucrats and BJP leaders. The masses have been left out even as their condition has gone from bad to worse,' said Congress leader Ramesh Varlyani.

The Congress ruled the state from November 2000 till the state's maiden assembly polls in November 2003.

'Go to the interiors of the Bastar region (in southern Chhattisgarh), and you will find in several pockets that people walk 60-70 km on foot through a forested stretch to access a primary health centre.'

The All-India Adivasi Mahasabha, an umbrella organisation of tribal bodies, which is active in the state's interiors, also ridicules the BJP government's growth claims.

'The only success of the BJP government in the state is it allowed Maoists to spread fast. Before it came to power, the rebels had a strong presence only in certain pockets of Bastar. Now their writ runs in the entire interiors,' said Manish Kunjam, president of the Mahasabha.

Maoist violence has claimed over 2,100 lives in the state.

Corruption has been a big bottleneck to implementing welfare and infrastructure projects in the iron ore-rich southern region as well as the coal-abundant north that form some of India's worst poverty-hit zones.

The state is also plagued by a poor health sector and human trafficking.

In the districts of Korea, Surguja, Jashpur, Raigarh, Korba, Janjgir-Champa, Bilaspur, Mahasamund and even Raipur, officials admit hundreds of families fall victims to human trafficking.

Most victims are young girls who are assured jobs as domestic helps in metros but get pushed into the sex racket by middlemen who run an organised racket in these districts.

'The state was carved out to take care of the tribals of Chhattisgarh who were left out of the development process for decades but they have been even more neglected and victimised since the state came into being and that is one of the reasons why Maoist insurgency is spreading fast,' said Kunjam.

(Sujeet Kumar can be contacted at sujeet.k@ians.in)

Government orders Suzlon to take down turbines in tribal lands

2010-11-16T21:41:00.000-08:00

The state government of Kerala has issued orders to remove turbines installed by wind turbine manufacturing giant in the Attappadi tribal area in the Pallakad district, according to reports in India.

Why India has fared better than Africa

2010-11-10T02:27:00.001-08:00

INDIA, which has lagged well behind Africa in economic reform, has nevertheless fared much better. Most Indian reforms occurred well before the spurt in GDP growth from 6% to 9%. British academic James Manor says that thoughtful people in Ghana and South Africa have asked him “How do the Indians do it? They have liberalised less than we have, but they have higher growth rates — and plenty of social stability.”

Let me attempt an answer. Economic success depends not just on economic reform but on institutional strength and historical skills — what economists call ‘initial conditions’. India and China are historical superpowers that accounted for 70% of world industrial production before the Industrial Revolution .

They declined during 300 years of western colonialism, but are now clawing themselves back to their initial high position. Indian bankers and traders in the 17th century were bigger than the East India Company .

Robert Clive thought that Murshidabad, which he entered after the Battle of Plassey, was richer than London in his time. Shajahan had the money and skills to build the Taj Mahal: his European contemporaries did not.

Seen in this light, the decline of India and China in the last 300 years was a temporary blip. Africa and Latin America will find it difficult to replicate the growth spurt in China and India because of very different initial conditions.

Lumping nations of Africa and Asia together into something called ‘developing countries’ is a political gimmick. In Africa, most agriculture was still slash-and-burn cultivation as recently as the 1970s. But most of Asia moved from slash-and-burn to permanent cultivation 3,000 years ago.

This provided leisure and opportunity for the ruling classes to develop considerable engineering and other skills. The exploited peasantry of 3,000 years also developed a cornucopia of skills and innovative techniques for survival. Africans emerging from slash-and-burn cultivators lack such skills: their economy had no markets or mercantile skills. Indians are not inherently superior in any way.

This is proved dramatically in India's tribal areas, which have just evolved from shifting to permanent cultivation. As in Africa, Indian tribal belts lack skills and mercantile attitudes. Plainsmen can easily dupe tribals into giving up their land.

The whole of Africa is not historically disadvantaged. Ancient agricultural countries like Egypt , Tunisia and Algeria are fully on par with India in growth potential, and in fact, are much richer than India today. But sub-Saharan Africa is disadvantaged compared to both India and Egypt. Progress in Indian tribal belts has been as difficult as in Africa. It is said that if a village committee in a tribal area has 11 tribals and one non-tribal, the non-tribal will dominate all decisionmaking: he alone will have the skills and resources.

It will take a couple of generations of good education and skill-building to close the gap. Many African countries are ahead of India in literacy. But they lag behind in institutional strength: many have been ruled and ruined by thugs.

The Nehruvian era was one of chronic economic underperformance. But it was also an era when institutional strength developed — democracy, independent judiciary, limits on arbitrary state action, high quality varsities and technical institutes.

Tribal communities stand their ground

2010-11-02T08:26:00.001-07:00

By: Prince Mathews Thomas/Forbes India
Latehar, Hazaribagh and Gumla in Jharkhand, Bastar in Chhattisgarh, Chandrapur in Maharashtra, the Jaintia Hills in Meghalaya… the list goes on. These are all districts in India where mining companies are locked in a battle with the local population over the mining rights in these regions.

Other than fighting mining companies, there are two factors common to all these regions. One, they have fertile land and dense forests. Two, indigenous tribes have been living on and off the land for generations. The tribals do not want to give up their lands for mining or for setting up power plants. They want to continue their traditional way of life. And this is one problem that will not disappear if you throw money at it.

Take Latehar for instance. The region has ample iron ore, bauxite and granite reserves. But its greatest treasure is coal. And companies of every size, from big ones like the Essar Group to lesser known ones like Abhijeet Group, want a slice of the pie. But the tribals in Latehar refuse to give up their land. They want to continue farming. This conflict, ostensibly between antiquity and modernity, is repeated in Chandrapur, Maharashtra, home to one of the oldest coal mines in the country. It is also a home to three-fourth of Maharashtra’s forests and tribes. Then there is the far-off region of Jaintia Hills in Meghalaya where French company Lafarge has been facing a resistance from the local population.

Tribals refusing to give up land is not a phenomenon unique to India. “There have been stand offs between indigenous people and mining companies in countries such as Australia and Brazil,” says anthropologist Felix Padel. “But nowhere is it as widespread as in India,” he says.

India has among the largest number of tribes in the world. But what makes Indian tribes unique is their geography. Across the country, India’s indigenous people live side by side with India’s most sought after natural resources.

This brings them into direct clash with India’s fast growing companies. “At the pace that we are growing, it is inevitable that we would need to develop our resources. It doesn’t make economic sense to import coal and iron ore when we have abundant of them,” says a senior official in a leading coal mining company. India also has an abundance of tribes. According to numbers from the government, there are 426 recognised tribes in the country.

Major battle over minor produce

2010-10-31T23:07:00.000-07:00

Author(s): Richard Mahapatra, Kumar Sambhav S..., Sumana Narayanan, Aparna Pallavi

Does this official data betray a conspiracy? Only 1.6 per cent of the 2.9 million claims approved under the Forest Rights Act recognise community rights; the rest recognise individual rights over forest dwellings and farms in forestland. Now consider this: community rights under the Act include the right to collect minor forest produce, like bamboo and tendu leaves, which accounts for half the forest department revenue. Reason enough for states to scuttle community rights, which the Centre is trying desperately to enforce. The government of India views MFP rights as a means to curb Naxalism since the states most affected by Naxalism are also home to the maximum number of people dependent on forest produce. These states contribute more than 90 per cent of the MFP trade
Down To Earth correspondents travelled to six states to unravel the conspiracy to deprive forest people of their rights. Richard Mahapatra reports from Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, Kumar Sambhav Shrivastava from Madhya Pradesh, Sumana Narayanan from Odisha and Andhra Pradesh and Aparna Pallavi from Maharashtra

Unsold tendu leaves at a forest department MFP godown in Chhattisgarh (Photo: Sayantan Bera)Two tribal villages in Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra—Mendha Lekha and Marda— savoured victory when they won community rights over their forest resources in August last year. The rights conferred under the Forest Rights Act of 2006 include the right to collect and sell minor forest produce (MFP). These include tendu leaves used in beedis, and bamboo that have high commercial value and were under the forest department’s control. Winning the right to manage these resources meant economic liberation to the two villages.
Soon, 60 other villages in the district filed claims for similar rights with the district authorities. Only eight were recognised, that too with riders. The document transferring rights to villages was ambiguous and imposed seven conditions; one of them was the residents could collect MFP but only for self-use. People realized they still had to battle forest officials unwilling to relinquish control over MFP. The expectations raised by Mendha Lekha and Marda winning forest rights were short-lived.
The forest department’s attempt to dilute the provisions of the Scheduled Tribes and other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, also known as Forest Rights Act (FRA), triggered protests. “Imposing conditions are against the letter and spirit of the Act,” said Roopchand Dhakne, a community leader of Ghati village in Gadchiroli. Besides rights over MFP, community rights include rights to pasture, water bodies and diversion of up to one hectare (ha) forestland for community infrastructure like schools. Gadchiroli district authorities have clubbed all these rights to show they cleared 193 community claims, but only 10 of these gave the right to collect MFP.
“This is a common trick being played across the country,” said Mohan Hirabai Hiralal of the NGO, Vrikshamitra, in Gadchiroli. He has helped villages file forest claims.
Opportunity lost
The trick came to light in August 2010 when the Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs, the nodal ministry for implementing FRA, released a status report. Of the 2.9 million claims settled under FRA, only 1.6 per cent (46,156) gave community rights and most of these did not include rights over MFP, the report said. All other titles were for agricultural land and dwellings in forestland. This is bad news for the 100 million forest dwellers in India who have been battling for community forest rights since colonial times (see ‘Many mutinies’,).



	“I have not heard of any demand for rights over MFP; not from the MP, MLA, sarpanch or the people. I think this is the latest obsession of NGOs”
	A K Singh, Chhattisgarh’s principal chief conservator of forests

“The focus has mostly been on giving individual pattas (for agricultural land and housing) while ignoring rights over MFP,” said N C Saxena, member of the National Advisory Council, who is reviewing FRA implementation. “We are losing the opportunity to economically empower tribal communities,” he said.
In Chhattigarh, the ground reality is no different. Of the 214,918 claims processed in the state, only 250 relate to community rights and none of them grant rights over MFP. The state’s principal chief conservator of forests, A K Singh said he had not heard of a demand for rights over MFP.
Most lower level forest officials who are supposed to help process forest rights claims are not aware of the provisions of the Act. “The directive from senior officials was to go to forest villages and collect signatures on forms that identify agricultural land and dwellings. We were not told about MFP,” said a forest officer of Darbha in Jagdalpur district of Chhattisgarh.
A study on the implementation of FRA in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh by non-profit Samarthan in Bhopal goes beyond the Centre’s status report. No community claims were approved in districts that have dense forests and high concentration of tribal population, the yet-to-be-released report states. The Chhattisgarh government started processing community claims only after the tribal affairs ministry ordered it in July 2008; even then the rights did not include MFP, it adds. The study spanning 10 districts, including Naxalite-affected areas, says the authorities allowed only certain community rights under the Act like school buildings. Though tribals ranked MFP as the number one community asset in terms of relevance to their lives, only 7.3 per cent claims cleared in Chhattisgarh gave community rights; in Madhya Pradesh, approval for such claims accounted for 23.6 per cent (see infographic ‘Red flag’,).
While forest officials claim there is no demand for rights over MFP, community leaders say the officials hid the fact that FRA included community rights over MFP. “One can smell a conspiracy. I have been to many gram sabha meetings on filing forest rights claims; MFP was rarely discussed,” said Mamata Dash of the National Forum of Forest People and Forest Workers in Delhi.
MFP sustains forest departments
The main reason forest department officials are not telling people about rights over MFP is that it is a major source of revenue for forest departments (see ‘Minor to major’,). Most states have nationalised certain MFP items— mahua, sal seeds and flowers, tendu leaves and certain gums. The produce accounts for 50 per cent of forest revenue, according to the forestry statistics of India; the states trade in them through cooperatives and corporations. FRA and the Panchayat (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA), however, render state trading of MFP illegal (see below: ‘Colonial legacy stays’).
Most forest departments earn more from MFP than timber. For example, Andhra Pradesh, earns Rs 82 crore from MFP, while its earning from timber is Rs 43 crore. In Chhattisgarh, the tendu capital of India, MFP accounts for 60 per cent of forest revenue. After the Supreme Court banned tree felling in forests without working plans, MFP has emerged as the main source of revenue for forest departments.
“They don’t want to part with the profits they make from MFP trade,” said Gautam Bandopadhyaya, an activist in Raipur in Chhattisgarh who works on forest rights. In most states, the first gram sabha meeting mandated by the Act was the platform for informing people about the Act and start processing the claims. “Communities implemented a historic Act without knowing its key provisions and effectively lost their rights over MFP,” said Dash.
“The political commitment that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act got, was not given to FRA,” a senior official of the Planning Commission’s perspective planning division said.
Bikash Rath of non-profit Regional Centre for Development Cooperation, in Bhubaneswar said even in places where communities have followed due process, community claims have been rejected. People in the villages of Odisha and Andhra Pradesh confirmed this. None of the villages Down To Earth (DTE) correspondents visited in these states had received rights over MFP; in some cases claims were rejected.
There are also instances where the forest officials prevent people from taking control over MFP. Mendha Lekha residents who have got rights over MFP were prevented from taking their produce to the market; forest officials told them they would need transit passes (see ‘Forest titles only on paper’, DTE, May 31, 2010). Sanjay Upadhyay, a partner in the Enviro Legal Defence Firm, an environmental law firm, said the dem - and for transit passes should be challenged in court so that the government issues a clarification that such passes are not needed when community claims have been approved under FRA. Marda residents said forest officials have been visiting them regularly and telling them their rights over MFP do not include tendu leaves and bamboo. A senior district official in Gadchiroli conceded loss of revenue from MFP is a major concern for forest and district officials.
Conspiracy of joint management
To retain hold over forests, various state forest departments are pushing for joint forest management (JFM) committees (first introduced in the 1990) to manage community forest rights. Such a committee is at the village-level and has a forest official as joint secretary. Minutes of a workshop of the Indian Forest Service officers on January 11 this year include a recommendation that these committees should be the new forest rights committees and declared village-level institutions under FRA.
A tribal woman collects herbs for domestic use. Villagers resent they receive only a fraction of the market value of the forest produce (Photo: Aparna Pallavi)In Balda panchayat in Koraput district of Odisha, the forest department tried to bring some of the forests used by the residents under JFM. “We did not allow it because we were worried it would curb our community rights,” said Jagdish Pangi of Parajaghindol village under the panchayat.
In Andhra Pradesh’s Paderu block in Visakhapatnam, the authorities carried out resettlement of 118 villages between 2002 and 2007, with funds from the World Bank. The plan was meant to compensate the tribals for the shifting agricultural land they lost under an earlier World Bank-funded JFM project. “People were told the money was for land improvement; they did not realise they would be signing away their land,” said P Devullu of non-profit Sanjeevini Rural Development Society in Visakhapatnam. The people who lost their land to the project could not claim rights under FRA.
“Such attempts by the forest department are unconstitutional,” said Subodh Kulkarni, a researcher in Pune who is studying implementation of FRA. But director general of forests in the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF), P J Dilip Kumar, said JFMs draw their authority from the gram sabhas and give representation to all sections of society. “Panchayats tend to get politicised and weaker sections of society are left out,” he said.
Ghati residents use PESA to seize timber felled by the forest department (Photo: Aparna Pallavi)PESA stalled
A battle for control over resources was witnessed when PESA was passed in 1996. The Act provides for community rights over MFP in tribal areas of nine states, which are also Naxal hot spots. PESA puts the gram sabhas in charge of MFP, but did not define what constitutes MFP.
Not a single state has drafted the rules under the Act to give effect to it (see ‘States retain control...’,). Maharashtra, Gujarat and Odisha tried to dilute the provisions of rights over MFP.
In Maharashtra, people were given rights over 33 MFP items. But within a year, these rights were transferred to the Tribal Development Corporation on the pretext that people were unable to manage MFP.
The Odisha government negated PESA by adding a clause in the corresponding state law that made the Act subject to existing laws. This includes the Non-Timber Forest Products Policy of 2000 that states panchayats shall have no control over MFP collected from reserve forests.
Technically, all laws that are in conflict with PESA ought to have been repealed after PESA came into force 13 years ago.
The Andhra Pradesh government bypassed PESA by giving rights over MFP to Van Suraksha Samitis (forest protection committees under JFM). The Madhya Pradesh government was prompt in effecting changes in the state laws in response to PESA. The state’s Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes department issued a circular to district collectors in April 1999 transferring powers to collect and sell MFP to gram panchayats. It also suitably amended the panchayat rules. But a few months later, the department issued another circular saying nationalised MFP items like tendu leaves would not be controlled by gram panchayats because PESA did not define MFP.
In these states, cooperative federations trade in nationalised MFP items.
War of words
Now the Centre views PESA and FRA as a means to curb Naxalism. Therefore, non-implementation of the provisions giving rights over MFP to people has triggered a fight between ministries. Secretary to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, G K Pillai, in a letter to MoEF in June this year, accused the forest department of atrocities against tribals in Madhya Pradesh and causing dissatisfaction among forest people. Copies of the letter were marked to the Prime Minister’s Office, the Planning Commission and the ministries for tribal affairs and panchayati raj.
MoEF responded by saying that it is poor governance that is spreading Naxalism and sought a ban on mining in forest areas.
It is learnt that the Planning Commission, which is finalising a Rs 13,000 crore development package for Naxalite-affected districts, proposes conditions for fund transfer under the programme: performance of the states in implementing PESA and FRA would be a major eligibility criterion. Media reports suggest the prime minister has asked the Commission to introduce stringent measures in the proposal to ensure transfer of power to panchayats. Planning Commission deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia has said that forest department-sponsored corporations dealing in MFP are illegal and has called for a better business model to benefit collectors of MFP.
The director general of forests, defended his ministry. “Without protection of MoEF and the Forest Conservation Act, Naxalites and industries will take over forest resources,” said Dilip Kumar.
MoEF is planning a project that may prove to be another flashpoint in the battle for rights over forest resources. The ministry wants to rope in tribals for its Green India Mission, one of the eight missions under the National Action Plan on Climate Change. The mission aims to increase forest cover by five million hectares by 2020 to curb greenhouse gas emissions; the forest people will be involved in planning, execution and monitoring activities. The mission will promote tree plantation on all types of land including common lands and degraded forests.
A Parliamentary standing committee in its report in 2008 has criticised such programmes, saying they promote monoculture. MFP depends on plant diversity and provide income in all seasons.
In some villages like Mendha Lekha, people have been opposing tree plantation drives saying it affects MFP.

MFP worth Rs 13 lakh is traded in a day at the Darbha weekly market

21 tribals vs 12 mn tonnes of steel

2010-10-25T21:59:00.001-07:00

Both Posco and the Orissa government said there were no tribals on the land for Posco’s 12 mn tonne steel plant. The presence of 21 tribals in the voters list has hit their credibility and probably the plant as well

A 4-member environment ministry committee has recommended that the environmental clearances given to Posco be revoked for the violation of existing laws, for serious lapses and suppression of facts. As always, we try to explain the issues in a simple Question & Answer format that makes complex issues more accessible to our readers.

How big is the Posco project?

Posco’s MoU with the Orissa government in June 2005 envisages setting up India’s largest iron and steel plant—12 million tonnes equals what 6 PSU plants (Bhilai, Bokaro, Durgapur, Rourkela, Burnpur and Salem) produce. The project is to be located in Kujang tehsil of Jagatsinghpur district. Most of the steel will be exported and a captive port is to be set up about 12 km south of Paradip port. The project also involves a captive power plant and a host of related infrastructure like township development. At $12 billion, this is India’s largest FDI till date.

What progress has been made so far?

None. It got major clearances in 2007 but the approval for the use of forest land came only in December 2009. The company began acquiring land last July but after the NC Saxena report on implementing the Forest Rights Act in Orissa (like for bauxite mining by Vedanta in Niyamgiri), which pointed to violations at the Posco site, the environment ministry asked Posco, on August 6, to stop all work till further directions.

What are the environmental issues?

They relate to forests, to the Coastal Zone Regulations (CRZ) and the environment clearance.

What is the forest issue?

More than 75% of the project’s 1,620.49 ha is forest land. Using this for ‘non-forest purposes’ requires Central approval under the Forest Conservation Act, 1980. In 2008, the Forest Rights Act also became operational, which gave individuals and communities dependent on forests not just a right over the forests, but also the right to protect and conserve these forests. This means that the project requires forest-dwelling communities to agree to Posco using the land. Posco’s December 2009 forest clearance was made conditional in January 2010, after it was alleged that the FRA procedures had not been followed.

And the other ones?

Posco’s port got environmental and CRZ clearance in May 2007 and the...

Salwa Judum – Petitioner arrested, situation worse claims affidavit

2010-10-22T21:35:00.000-07:00

New Delhi: On September 1 last Supreme Court of India had slammed Chhattisgarh Government and directed the state to file a comprehensive affidavit on its stand towards Salwa Judum. Thereafter on September 14, the lead petitioner in the case got arrested without even a mention of his involvement in the initial FIR. This is certainly not a coincidence, pointed out Professor Nandini Sundar in an affidavit filed today before the Supreme Court.

The affidavit filed before the apex court bench of Justices BS Reddy and SS Nijjar states that petitioner Kartam Joga has been arrested on 14.09.2010 on false charges of being involved in Tadmetla ambush of 06.04.2010, which left 76 CRPF personnel dead. Noticeably, Joga was not named in the initial FIR dated on 08.04.2010 regarding the incident.

Despite promising that they (Government) would facilitate the visit of petitioners to Chhattisgarh, the petitioners according to Professor Nandini Sundar were surrounded with Special Police Officers and prevented from visiting villages. As per Sundar, Chief Secretary, Chhattisgarh has written to the petitioners not to waste their time fighting in what he has described as the “dreary law courts”.

The bench in previous hearing had slammed Chhattisgarh for submitting “vague and evasive” affidavit and had directed them to file a fresh comprehensive affidavit covering five points : 1. The present status of Salwa Judum and why it should not be disbanded; 2. Status of Relief and Rehabilitation; 3. Removal of security forces from schools and ashrams; 4. Progress on registration, investigation and trial of criminal offences; 5. An independent monitoring committee to oversee issues mentioned above.

While government today failed to file any such affidavit an unhappy court gave more time and directed them to file the affidavit before next hearing i.e. Thursday, October 28.

Ground Situation
Nandini Sundar also points out the ground realities she came across during her visit to the Naxal hit areas.

Against government claims of its complete non-existence, “Salwa Judum is in animated suspension and revived under a new name, Dandakaranya Shanti Sangharsh Samiti; villagers also refer to SPOs as Judum when they carry out arson or killings under guise of Operation Green Hunt; most importantly, Chhattisgarh Government has never acknowledged or punished illegal acts by Judum”, claimed Sundar in the affidavit.

Besides pointing out the aforesaid situation she states that “overall, one may safely conclude that there is a widespread frustration with a paramilitary focused approach, and an overwhelming desire for peace talks on all sides”.

Petitioners in this PIL of 2007, apart from Kartam Joga, include sociologist Nandini Sunder, historian Ramchandra Guha and Former Secretary, Economic Affairs (GOI) EAS Sharma among others. The PIL draws attention to the atrocities inflicted on the tribals of the region by ‘Salwa Judum’ and the armed forces. The petitioners claim that tribals are sandwiched in the war between the State, ‘Salwa Judum’ and the Naxals. They claim that ‘Salwa Judum’ is not self-motivated as claimed by the state government but state sponsored. Further, that in the name of fighting Naxals the forest land is being evacuated and given to corporates while tribals are left in miserable conditions in the camps.

India: The Maoists And Their Mines

2010-10-13T21:09:00.000-07:00

Three Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel were killed when the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadres triggered a landmine explosion targeting a vehicle carrying the ITBP personnel near Kohka village in the Rajnandgaon District of Chhattisgarh on October 8. The landmine was planted under a culvert just yards from the Kohka Police Outpost. Earlier, on October 4, a landmine blast triggered by the Maoists killed five Security Force (SF) personnel at Perimili in the Gadchiroli District of Maharashtra. On October 5, the Maoists triggered a landmine in the Talewada Forest area of Gadchiroli, injuring eight SF personnel, who were part of the rescue team travelling in an anti-mine vehicle from Pranhita headquarters at Aheri to Perimili, to retrieve the body of a Policeman killed on October 4.

These are only the latest among an endless and increasingly effective series of landmine and improvised explosive device (IED) attacks executed by the Maoists over years. According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), 442 persons have been killed while 422 have received injuries in a total of 380 incidents of landmine explosion by the Maoists since 2005. 52 of these incidents were major (comprising of three or more than three fatalities).

The two worst-affected States, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, together account for 329 (74.44 per cent) of these fatalities. However, Orissa (79) has witnessed the highest number of landmine incidents, followed by Jharkhand (78) and Chhattisgarh (78). Explaining the gravity of the situation in the State, the Director General of Chhattisgarh Police Vishwa Ranjan stated, on May 9, 2010, "Bastar region is spread over nearly 40,000 square kilometres area, of which up to 25,000 square kilometres is intensively mined." Abujmadh in Chhattisgarh, which forms the Central Guerrilla Base Area of the Maoists, is secured by a complex system of landmines and IEDs throughout this densely forested expanse of some 4,000 square kilometres.

The Maoist use of landmines against the SFs has wide variants. Small contingents of SFs passing through inhabited areas are targeted with mines placed under the road surface, and triggered without the militants engaging in any direct confrontation with the Forces. When they take on large contingents of SFs deeper in the forest, however, landmines are used as a first shock, before engaging the troops in gun battles. Significantly, in the country’s worst Maoist attacks on April 6, 2010, in which 75 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel and a State Police trooper were killed in an ambush in the thick Mukrana forests of Dantewada District in Chhattisgarh, the Maoists were aware of the CRPF movement and executed their attack with fierce precision. They first blew up the SF’s anti-landmine vehicle and then began firing indiscriminately. The shocked and exhausted troopers had failed to follow standard operating procedures, and were massacred. Similarly, on February 9, 2010, an SF contingent was hit by a landmine and then ambushed by Maoist cadres at a village in Dantewada District, when they were on a search for 12 missing tribals in pursuance of a Supreme Court order passed on February 8.

Some of the major incidents of explosion orchestrated by the Maoists against SFs include the following:

April 4, 2010: 11 personnel of the anti-Maoist Special Operation Group (SOG) were killed and eight others were seriously injured when cadres of the CPI-Maoist triggered a landmine blast targeting a mini bus carrying the SOG personnel at Tanginiguda on the Govindpalli Ghat road in Koraput District of Orissa.

June 20, 2009: 12 CRPF personnel were killed in a landmine blast triggered by the CPI-Maoist cadres at Tonagapal in Dantewada District of Chhattisgarh.

June 12, 2009: CPI-Maoist cadres detonated a landmine in the Nawadih area of the Dantewada District of Chhattisgarh, killing at least 11 SF personnel and injuring eight.

June 10, 2009: 11 Policemen, including a CRPF Inspector, were killed and six were injured, when CPI-Maoist cadres triggered a landmine explosion targeting their vehicle in West Singhbhum District of Jharkhand.

May 11, 2009: 12 Policemen and a civilian were killed and seven others injured in a landmine blast triggered by the Maoists at Risgaon village in the Dhamtari District of Chhattisgarh. The incident took place when the Maoists blew up a Police vehicle carrying the Police personnel.

August 30, 2008: 12 Police personnel were killed when the vehicle they were travelling in was blown up in a landmine blast in the East Singhbhum District of Jharkhand.

July 16, 2008: CPI-Maoist cadres killed 17 personnel of the Special Operations Group (SOG) of the Orissa Police in a landmine blast in the Malkangiri District.

November 2, 2007: Around 100 cadres of the CPI-Maoist ambushed a Police party near Pamedu Police Station in the Bijapur District of Chhattisgarh and killed 16 Policemen, including six CRPF personnel. The Maoists first triggered a landmine explosion and then indiscriminately fired on the Policemen killing 16.

December 2, 2006: 14 Police personnel belonging to the Special Task Force of the Jharkhand Police were killed and three injured in a landmine blast detonated by suspected CPI-Maoist cadres at Kanchkir in the Bokaro District.

June 1, 2006: At least 12 Police personnel were killed when CPI-Maoist cadres triggered a landmine explosion in the West Singhbhum District of Jharkhand.

September 3, 2005: 23 CRPF personnel and two from the State Police were killed in a landmine explosion triggered by the CPI-Maoist near Padeda village in the Dantewada District of Chhattisgarh.

January 5, 2005: CPI-Maoist cadres killed the Munger Superintendent of Police, K.C. Surendra Babu, and six Police personnel in a landmine explosion near the Bhimbandh area of the District in Bihar.

The Maoists have also used landmines and IEDs against civilian targets. Some of the most significant of these incidents include:

August 3, 2010: Five persons of a private security agency travelling by a car were killed when CPI-Maoist cadres blew up a culvert with a landmine near Pirtand in Giridih District of Jharkhand.

April 16, 2009: Five poll officials, including a zonal officer identified as A.K. Acharya, were killed and many others injured when CPI-Maoist cadres blew up a van ferrying election officials by triggering a landmine blast at Phulwera village in the Rajnandgaon District of Chhattisgarh.

May 16, 2006: In a landmine explosion triggered by the CPI-Maoist, 12 members of a marriage group were killed between Halebada and Patha villages in Gadchiroli District of Maharashtra.

March 25, 2006: 11 persons were killed and four others sustained injuries in a landmine blast triggered by the CPI-Maoist in Kanker District of Chhattisgarh.

February 28, 2006: At least 25 tribals were killed and 40 others sustained injuries in a landmine blast triggered by the CPI-Maoist near Eklagoda village, in the jurisdiction of Arabore Police Station of Dantewada District in Chhattisgarh.

A wide range of improvised devices, including camera flashes, wires, switches, holders, batteries and cell phones have been used by the Maoist to rig explosions and, as Dantewada Superintendent of Police (SP) Rahul Sharma, notes, "landmines are the Maoists’ favourite weapon." A June 18, 2010, report by the office of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, submitted to the UN Security Council, noted: "The Naxals [Maoists] have admitted that children… were provided with training to use non-lethal and lethal weapons, including landmines."

The Maoists bury their landmines even under concrete roads, in addition to placing them under kacha (non-metalled) roads. Unsurprisingly, the Union Government on October 28, 2009, had warned that incidents of landmine explosions, ambushes and train blockages would increase.

The constant and greater degree of use of landmines by the Maoists in their fight against the establishment has become a major concern for the authorities. To counter this, according to a November 24, 2007, report, the Jharkhand Police decided to form motorcycle squads arguing, "In jungles, Maoists detonate vehicles by triggering landmine blasts. But it will be difficult to blast bikes." But this is, at best, a shot in the dark. Chhattisgarh Police DGP, Vishwa Ranjan, on May 9, 2010, notes, "The big problem is, we have no technology and resources to de-mine the massive forested pockets. Without taking out landmines it's literally impossible to go after them (the Maoists) freely in thickly forested areas where Maoists are always ready with a booby trap."

Ajit Kumar Singh, Research Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management

Group pro-tribals; will look into complaints: Vedanta chief

2010-10-11T19:50:00.000-07:00

Mumbai, Oct 12 (PTI) Over a month after its about USD 1.7 billion mining project in Orissa was rejected on charges of violation of environmental norms, Vedanta Resources today said the group is pro-tribals and will look into "complaints".
Environment Ministry had in August rejected all earlier clearances given to the metal and mining group to mine bauxite from environmentally sensitive Niyamgiri area in Orissa which also said to be home to tribals like Dongria Kondha.
The Congress General Secretary, Rahul Gandhi, had also termed the proposed project "illegal".
"Rahul Gandhi said I am not against development. But tribals should be given their rightful ... I am also for tribals. We have to protect tribals. We have no tribals in our area. But if there are complaints they have to be looked into properly," Vedanta Resources Chairman Anil Agarwal told PTI in an interview.
"There is a misconception that we are doing mining (at Niyamgiri). Not a blade has moved. I am buying bauxite (from Orissa Mining Corporation)," he added.
Vedanta Group firm Sterlite Industries had form a JV company with state PSU Orissa Mining Corporation in 2004 for mining bauxite from the region. The JV company, in which Sterlite had majority stake, was also given conditional nod by a special bench of the Supreme Court in 2008 for the project.
The Environment Ministry, however, cancelled clearances to the group after a three-member committee commissioned by it found human rights and green norms'' violations by Vedanta Group.
The ministry had also issued show-cause notice to the group asking as to why action should not be taken against the group for going ahead with expansion of its alumina refinery in the region without getting requisite clearances.
Vedanta has maintained that it has violated no laws and sought bauxite from the state government as per the supply agreement to feed its refinery.
"Govt should give us bauxite," he said. Vedanta Group says that OMC, as per the MoU, has to supply 150 million tonnes of bauxite to it.
Asked if the group will apply for mining leases on its own, in face of the Centre considering tightening noose on such "back-door" mining pacts, he said, "I am OK with everything. Whether it is through government agency or directly."
"Aluminium is fundamental for growth. China produces 20 million tonnes of aluminium. India produces 1.5 million tonnes. But, China doesn''t have any bauxite and we have all the resource," he added.
On allocation of alternate mines in Orissa to run its aluminium projects in Orissa, he indicated, the process may take some time. "It will be a complete new process. State government has to approve (the new site), the central government (will look into it)," he said.

Tripura tribal party to join stir of regional parties in Delhi

2010-10-05T22:22:00.000-07:00

Agartala, Oct 6 : Despite showing dismal performance in recently held elections, the Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura (IPFT) has declared that its demand for a separate state for the tribals would remain focal point of the party. The party leaders opine the issue has a long term impact to recon with tribal
politics and understands its irrelevance at present.

IPFT is to forge tie with other regional parties to raise demands of similar nature and put pressure on the union government. Then regional parties from all northeastern states would organise a demonstration and rally at New Delhi on October 28 and 29.

“I am leading a big delegation to join the protest programme at Delhi. The participants would be from the IPFT and a few other tribal forums”, IPFT President Narendra Chandra Debbarma said on Monday.

IPFT is demanding creation of a separate tribal state with areas under the sixth schedule of the constitution. The demand has faced a strong objection from the mainstream parties like CPI(M) and the Congress.

Debbarma expected that several thousand leaders and activists from regional parties would visit Delhi for the purpose. They include 2500 people from Bodoland in Assam.

More than one hundred tribal men and women would represent the IPFT in Delhi. Narendra Chandra Debbarma asserted that every regional party does not necessarily have a common agenda, but every demand is common towards achieving rights of the indigenous people in respective areas.

“In January last we observed a 72 hour hunger strike in Delhi and the forthcoming stir is the follow up to make the government leaders understand plight of people of the region”, he said.

No CWH status to Cotigao: Tribals

2010-10-04T22:22:00.001-07:00

PANAJI: The Gawada, Kunbi, Velip and Dhangar (GAKUVED) Federation has, in a memorandum, expressed opposition to the state government's decision to declare Cotigao Wildlife Sanctuary a critical wildlife habitat.

The memorandum, submitted to a state-level expert committee formed to carry out public hearings in this regard, stated that the sanctuary should not be declared a critical wildlife habitat without settling the claims of tribals as has been provided under the Forest Rights Act, 2006.

The Federation has stated that not settling the claims of the tribes and forest dwellers first will amount to a violation of Article 21 of the Constitution of India. The article assures the Adivasi tribes the right to their environment and the right to live with human dignity.

To further highlight problems relating to land belonging to the tribal people, the GAKUVED Federation has attached to the memorandum, recommendations made in this regard by the jury of a 'people's tribunal' formed by the Federation.

After hearing 60 submissions by tribals from different parts of Goa, the people's tribunal has stated in its report, "In all the cases we have heard, it is seen that land records have either been manipulated in the revenue department, without any notice to the Adivasis who have been in possession of the land for generations, or they have been vacated from their land by force." The panel has also brought to light cases of police repression when the Adivasis have had to resort to protests for their rights, as narrated by the tribals.

"The land problems associated with forest lands have arisen either due to the settlement process being ignored or because of faulty settlement. It has resulted in non-recording and non-recognition of rights. All these cases now come under the purview of the Forest Rights Act, 2006, whose implementation has not been initiated by the government...All proceedings to have the Adivasis dispossessed should be stopped forthwith," the GAKUVED Federation has demanded.

The memorandum also stated, "The fields, khazans, plateaus, forests and water bodies have been nurtured and preserved by the Adivasis whose livelihoods are sustainable and harmonious with nature. However, irresponsible mining, indiscriminate industrialization and haphazard real estate development have been responsible for the attack on the lands, lives and livelihoods of these very Adivasis who have been the custodians of Goa's environment."

The organization, therefore, states that every planning and development exercise should include the restoration of the land use based on traditional rights of the Adivasis on Goa's land.

Tribal tilt in steel ministry design

2010-09-30T22:24:00.000-07:00

New Delhi, Oct 1 : The steel ministry will lobby for a more generous land acquisition policy and ensure higher spending by state-run steel and mining firms in tribal areas.

“We support a more generous deal for land losers. We need to go beyond what we have given so far. The package should ideally offer monetary compensation, jobs and skills training so that tribals can actually access the jobs on offer in mines and industries set up on their land,” steel minister Virbhadra Singh told The Telegraph.

The government has been working on a land acquisition bill that was earlier blocked by Trinamul Congress leader and railway minister Mamata Banerjee, who wanted a more generous deal for land losers and strict adherence to the definition of public purpose in takeover of land by entities, including the public sector.

The government is also struggling to frame guidelines for the private sector to buy land from tribals in the mineral-rich yet Maoist-dominated areas of central and eastern India.

“In some sense my thinking is similar to Mamata’s. In fact, I will be taking up the issue with steel firms such as Posco and Arcelor Mittal who want land for steel mills and mines,” said Singh.

“It is important that industry spends on training and educating tribals and provide them basic amenities such as roads, medical facilities and schools even before they set up their factories. The time gap between acquisition and actual commissioning of a plant or a mine should be spent on training tribal land losers for the jobs that will be on offer,” Singh said.

He said the Nehruvian model of building steel mills as “temples of modern India” followed an extremely humane policy towards tribals, which is why PSUs still have a lot of goodwill in districts where they operate.

The minister also saw little merit in SAIL and Tata Steel’s attempts for exemption from a proposed rule that calls upon miners to share 26 per cent of profits with tribal land losers.

“I am for it (giving 26 per cent of mining profits to land losers). It needs a group of ministers’ approval as well as cabinet approval. I will support whatever final shape this bill (mining bill) takes.”

Steel ministry officials said firms would be advised to split their mining and steelmaking operations so that tribals were actually offered 26 per cent of mining profits.

Singh, however, said the new mining bill being considered by the government would “have to take into account the historical role played by state-run steel firms such as SAIL, KIOCL and RINL in the development of the steel sector and should have a different yardstick for allotting them mines”.

The bill tries to bring about a level playing field between state-run and private sector firms and asks all of them to bid for mining leases, something which the PSUs feel is unfair, given the amount of money they have historically pumped into social welfare and infrastructure projects in tribal areas.

“Half the roads in iron ore rich districts of Jharkhand and Orissa were built by SAIL,” steel ministry officials said.

Singh said he had already given instructions to PSUs under him to step up development and social welfare activities in tribal areas.

SAIL has established 61 primary health centres, eight reproductive and child health centres, 18 hospitals and six super-specialty hospitals for 26.7 million people, steel ministry officials said.

Compensating the displaced

2010-09-21T21:30:00.001-07:00

The government appears to be moving towards finalising legislation to ensure that those displaced by mining projects get 26 per cent of the profit accruing from them. This is in response to the growing realisation, after the rise of militancy in central India, that those dispossessed by such projects, mainly forest-dwelling tribals and cultivators, need to be made a part of the development process as winners, not losers. The intention is sound but the device chosen is not. Government cannot pre-empt revenues like this and hurt mining interests. There are other ways in which government can raise revenues rather than eat into profits, and that too in perpetuity. After all, there is also the issue of inter-generational equity involved here. Industry associations have opposed the idea on the ground that this may make such projects unviable. While that was seen as largely the stance of the private sector, the opposition to the idea has now been strengthened by public sector giant Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) joining the naysayers. The SAIL chiefâ€™s contention is that currently mines are owned by the company which handles the entire steel-making process; creating a separate entity for mining will be problematic. It is also worth noting that a share of the profits may not be good for the displaced in the long run as there can be periods of losses (mineral prices can crash during a serious economic slowdown) and imaginative accounting can turn black into shades of red even in good times.

The best way to proceed in this matter is not to lose sight of the fundamentals. If tribals and cultivators, deprived of their traditional means of livelihood by development, should benefit and not suffer from it, then how best to go about the task? Paying the entire compensation as a lump sum is not a good idea. Those not used to seeing big money can blow it up, aided and abetted by sharks. The cardinal aim must be for the displaced to acquire new skills and new means of livelihood with the help of the capital available as compensation. Hence, the Haryana model of splitting up the compensation into a lump sum component and an annuity that runs for 30 years is gaining acceptance. But the question of training and help to start new ventures remains, as also the need to recreate displaced communities and preserve at least some parts of their tradition. Tata Steel, the other integrated steel maker which says it has always shared its prosperity with neighbouring communities, has made some suggestions. Make the social cost of resettlement a part of operational costs, not profits, during the life of the mine. It can be levied in the manner of mining royalty. It also focuses on the utilisation of the levy. This should be done in consultation with the community, possibly through a trust or local development body in which the community, government and the corporate house in question participate. In reality, money is only a part of what it needs to help people learn new means of livelihood and sustain and rejuvenate their communities after the disorientation of shifting. Knowledgeable public-spirited individuals have to help, hence the notion of a trust.

The dilemma of mining and forests

2010-09-14T01:21:00.001-07:00

The rejection of Vedanta’s proposal to mine for bauxite in Orissa’s Niyamgiri hill area, home to the Dongria Kondhs, by the environment ministry has been universally hailed as a blow struck for the rights of tribals.

However, in the exultation by editorialists, activists, politicians and sundry others, one crucial factor is being ignored. If this ruling is a precedent, what will happen to India’s metallurgical industry, which is on the cusp of an expansion phase?

“Where is the connection?” the lay person may ask.

The fact of the matter is that more than 70 per cent of the major minerals (such as iron ore, coal, bauxite and chromite) required by the metallurgical industry and thermal power sector are located in the country’s forested areas, which are also the home of the majority of India’s tribals.

Mining these minerals will clearly necessitate clearing some of the forested areas, initially digging up the land and thus reducing it to waste, displacing those who live in these regions

and upsetting their traditional livelihoods, be it farming, gathering forest produce or hunting.

Yes, we have heard of “minimum impact mining”, compensatory afforestation, re-greening of mined areas and all the other mumbo-jumbo that the mining industry throws at the public in an effort to camouflage the fact that mining is basically habitat destructive when it is being done.

If someone can demonstrate how to make an omelette without breaking eggs, then perhaps we can believe that mining can be harmless to the environment. The repair happens, if at all, many years later and after considerable investment and sustained effort. By that time, the initial ecology and the original inhabitants have vanished or been changed beyond recognition.

Having got that clear, we are left with the uncomfortable fact that mining for feeding the metallurgical industries and power sector will be strictly a “No! No!” in India, if legal fiat proclaims that the forests and the inhabitants, including the tribals, should not be disturbed. Does that mean that we bid goodbye to the billions of dollars of investment that these industries could bring in, not to mention the millions of employment opportunities they can generate?

How about importing the minerals needed? After all, Japan and South Korea managed to develop gigantic metallurgical industries mainly through import of the required ore. True enough. But they could compensate the high cost of imports by exporting finished metal products or equipment made from the metals to big consumers like Europe and the USA. That market has virtually dried up long ago. Where will India export to pay for its imports of minerals?

Moreover, India needs the metals and the power for its own development process. For instance, we make today around 55 million tonnes of steel per annum, all of which is consumed domestically. By 2020, it is estimated that we may need nearly 200 million tonnes of steel per year for ourselves, to sustain a 9 per cent per annum GDP growth rate. Where is the question of exporting the material?

Moreover, to make metal, it is far cheaper to use domestically available raw material compared to the imported stuff. Just to give one example: the international price of iron ore is over ten times the cost of mining it in India. This is precisely the reason why the South Korean steel giant, Posco, is

anxious to get hold of an ore mining licence before committing billions

of dollars in putting up a steel plant in Orissa.

So, where do we go from here? Should we put a lid on the ambitious programme to enhance thermal power generation in the country so that we are not crippled by 12-hour power cuts per day in the future?

Should we drastically prune all infrastructure projects in the pipeline which need massive amounts of metals in various forms?

Or, better still, let us bid farewell to the whole industrialisation game, get back to the good old “Hindu” rate of growth which we suffered for the first four decades after Independence and get back to being an impoverished agrarian economy.

The only problem with that is a humongous 250 million youths will be entering the labour market in the next two decades. Agriculture, which is already starved of land, will not give this multitude the jobs they will be demanding.

The only way out of the grinding poverty that afflicts the inhabitants (and this includes the tribals) of India’s least developed states such as Jharkhand, Orissa, Chhattisgarh and Bihar is to exploit their considerable mineral wealth.

But this involves mining which involves collateral damage to the local environment which involves harm to the local population.

We can, of course, choose not disturb anything, abjure mining and industry and sit back with the halos intact on our heads.

Of course this will condemn the indigenous people to continue their precarious, “plant to mouth” existence, as they have been doing for aeons. If we are comfortable with this, so be it.

The other path is strewn with many pitfalls, involves shedding our moralistic halos but gives the locals a chance to emerge from the morass of extreme poverty. And that is to take advantage of the bounty of minerals bestowed by nature but do so in ways that minimise collateral damage and, at the same time, ensure the primacy of benefits to the locals — whether it be jobs or profits or contracts or shareholding or habitat or health facilities or education or what have you.

So, what is it going to be, stasis or stumble forward?

Tribal clash kills one in Assam

2010-09-09T06:00:00.001-07:00

Guwahati, Sept 9 One person was killed and other 10 people were injured in a clash between tribal organizations in Assam’s Kamrup (Rural) district on Thursday, police said.

According to police, over 1000 activists of tribal organizations, including Garo United Front (GUF) and Garo National Council (GNC), were scheduled to block the Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi (LGB) International Airport at Borjhar near Guwahati on Thursday, demanding creation of a Garo Autonomous Council and immediate commencement of Council polls.

When the protesters came out to block the LGB airport and NH-37, a group of Rabha Hasong tribal supporters blocked the route of the Garo agitators at Boko area.

The angry Garo agitators crossed the barricade and beat up the Rabha Hasong tribal supporters, where several youths were injured.

The injured people were rushed to nearest hospital.

Later, a 26-year-old youth named Suvan Rabha succumbed to his injuries.

Security forces have rushed to Boko area to control the situation.

"One youth died and over 10 were injured in the clash," a police official said

“Now the situation is under control. We have already deployed security forces at the area,” he added.

The Garo agitators, on their way to LGB Airport, were stopped by a contingent of state police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) at Mirza area in the district.

The Garos of the Goalpara and Kamrup (Rural) district areas were demanding exclusion of their villages from the Rabha Hasong Autonomous Council’s jurisdiction and demanding creation a separate Garo Autonomous Council and holding of immediate Council polls.

Spanish lessons for India

2010-09-07T23:08:00.001-07:00

The recent turn in the Basque separatist movement--and some years ago in Sinn Fein--provides lessons for India in its struggle against the Naxal menace

Most terrorist organizations are loath to abjure violence and give up the power of the gun. So when the Spanish terrorist group ETA, which has been demanding an independent state, said it was renouncing violence, few believed it. Yet the ETA’s “ceasefire” and the conditions that made it possible confirm a growing trend worldwide. There are lessons for India.

ETA has for long demanded a separate homeland in the Basque region of north-eastern Spain and a part of south-western France. It has waged a long and bloody battle for its goals. It has failed. For the first time in its history, it’s ETA’s political wing, Batasuna, that is calling the shots. This put pressure on the ETA to halt its armed campaign. A similar development was seen some years ago in northern Ireland when the political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), Sinn Fein, decided to conduct its politics in a non-violent manner.

In both cases, those of Batasuna and the Sinn Fein, there was widespread opposition to violence in places where these groups operate. Normal people, who had little to do with secessionist politics, were tired of decades of violence on the part of terrorists and government troops. “Intellectuals” who favoured the ETA and IRA also realized the futility and senselessness of violence.

The three factors combined to end terrorism. It is interesting to note that these ingredients against terrorist violence are missing in India. In Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) and among the Maoists, the political wing is powerless and the “boys” with the guns dictate strategy.

The issue of opposition to terrorism in India is more complex. In Spain and northern Ireland, the territorial extent of terrorist operations is wide. Those are small countries where almost the entire population is affected by terrorism. In India, violence of this kind is localized: It exists in J&K, the “faraway” states such as Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Andhra Pradesh. In a sense, it is a localized problem and opposition to terrorism gets diffused.

Finally and crucially, terrorists continue to enjoy sympathy among Indian intellectuals. The latter go to great lengths to justify what the former do. Some call violence a “reaction against the Indian state”, others term it “a response to a war on tribals” and so on. These justifications only embolden extremists and give legitimacy to violence. The Spanish experience tells us what to do if terrorism is to abate.

Migrant tribals urge PM intervention for status in Assam

2010-09-01T22:51:00.001-07:00

Ranchi, Sep 2 (PTI) Migrant tribal workers in Assam have urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to find a solution to their demand for recognition as tribals by the state government.

Heading a tribal delegation yesterday, Congress leader and MP Ramdayal Munda aprised Singh of the importance of giving recognition to the migrant tribals by Assam, according to a press release by Munda issued here today.

"About 80 lakh tribals from Chhatisgarh, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Jharkhand migrated to Assam to work in tea gardens several years ago and settled there.

But they have not been given tribal status in Assam yet," Munda informed the Prime Minister.If the migrants were recognised as tribals, Munda claimed, they could be of help in the BSF's efforts to check people from Bangladesh crossing over the borders.

The Prime Minister assured the delegation of finding a solution with regard to the migrants tribal status in Assam, he said.

The Rahul Avatar

2010-08-29T22:14:00.001-07:00

Meghnad Desai

Rahul Gandhi keeps away from day to day politics. He has quite rightly shunned Cabinet and is busy in the Congress grassroots organisation. Yet, he continues to have a very high ‘voltage’ impact in whatever he does. His intervention in the Niyamgiri tribes’ campaign in Orissa against Vedanta is themost recent such high voltage intervention.

The state of the tribal peoplehas been a sorry one in independent India. The most deprivedHindu jatis, the Dalits and the OBCs, have been politicised byMandal. This has led to political party formations which have made these jatis their clients andthe usual patron-client relationshipshave led to some trickle down (Muslims have not gained to the same extent but I’ll leave that aside for the moment). But the tribal people seem to have lost out. There is not even a debate about the Census enumerating tribes, despite there being hundreds of separate tribes on whom we have little information. How many tribal languages do we have and how many will get recognitionas being official

The long campaign which the Naxals have waged in the Dandakaranya area has at last opened the eyes of the Congress at least (where is the BJP?) on this issue. It is obvious that the setting up of Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh has not ensured that benefits reacheveryone and not just top office holders and their families. We can do better.

Yet, the welfare of the tribalpeople is not an easy topic to tackle. There is a great temptationto argue that they should be left to live in their pristine state, the ‘NobleSavages’. But freezing thetribal people in ecological slums is not the answer. Eventually their children, if not they, will watch TV someday and ask, ‘where is my mobile, my laptop, my IIT’?.

One response which is the strength of Indian democracy is to politicise the tribal people by encouraging them to play to their electoral strength. If the tribal vote bank can be organised, it will exact its own share of the national dividend. It is a messy process but then the Dalits and OBCs have shown how it can be done. Rahul Gandhi was making a subtle pitch for Congress priority for this nascent vote bank and why not.

Yet, in his rhetoric of the ‘two Indias’—he has spoken to of it in Niyamgiri and elsewhere—there lurks a danger. There has been a tendency lately in the Congress to treat the poor variously defined and measured as a safe vote bank which has to be catered for by way of food subsidies and occasional work. This costs a lot but it is seen as a just tax on India to take care of Bharat. This policy may seem humane but it does nothing to get the poor out of poverty. The MGNREGA is a policy which restricts labour mobility and fobs off the poor with lower pay than they would make if they followed employment opportunities. But then if they stay at home, they vote locally and guess for which party? Hence, the scheme. Food subsidies are another waste of resources which do not help the poor. It would be cheaper to give cash to the poor.

I saw a poignant item on some TV channel, where a drought-hit farmer in Bihar was complaining that the drought made it difficult for him to send his children to school. He showed the right priority. He was worried not about food but about the future of his children. It is education and acquiring skills that will take the poor out of the hell-holes they are stuck in. The poor of Bharat have to join India and not stay on in Bharat, receiving 30 kg of rice or wheat.

It is this switch in the Congress vision which Rahul has to accomplish. For too long the Socialism of Congress has harboured anti-liberalisation ideas along with sentimentality about the poor. That was then. Gen X has to do better than the sloppy anti-poverty policies of the last sixty years. That is something Rahul Gandhi could do. Let him start with Niyamgiri.

Rahul to tribals: Rich India vs Poor India... I am your soldier

2010-08-27T01:16:00.000-07:00

By Debabrata Mohanty

Accused by the ruling BJD of stalling development in Orissa and engineering the Environment Ministry rejection of the Vedanta bauxite mining project in the Niyamgiri hills, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi today turned to the “rich India-poor India” argument to hit back, saying true development can only take place by “respecting interests of the poor and tribals, and not by muffling their voices”.

“There are two Indias — Ameeron ki Hindustan (India of the rich) whose voices reach everywhere, and the Garibon ka Hindustan whose voices are seldom heard. In the 2004 election, we had said the Congress would raise the voice of the poor and backward in Delhi. We have done it,” Gandhi told a party-sponsored rally for tribal rights in the foothills of the Niyamgiri hills.

“This is your victory. You saved your own land. Two years ago you had come to me saying the Niyamgiri hill is your god. I told you I would be your sipahi (soldier) in Delhi. I am happy that I have helped you in whatever way I could. What is important is that your voice was heard without violence,” he said.

The Dongaria Kondhs, the tribals living in Niyamgiri hills, cheered him on. “I am happy that Rahul has helped us keep our homes intact,” said Kadreka Singari, a woman who had come for the rally from Raygada district.

Referring to the tribals’ refusal to leave Niyamgiri which they consider their god, Gandhi said: “In my religion, all are equal — whether it is rich or poor, Dalits or Adivasis. Wherever an individual’s voice is being stifled, that is against my religion.”

He did not, however, name the Vedanta group whose million-tonne-per-annum alumina refinery here is now in jeopardy after the Environment Ministry’s refusal to clear the bauxite mining project.

“Some people say this (stopping of the mining project) is against development. But this is not against development as tribal voices were being suppressed. Development means that the voice of the poor is heard. It does not mean that the rights of tribals are taken away for the development of a few people,” Gandhi said.

Citing examples of Andhra Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi, he said development in Congress-ruled states was taking place rapidly by “hearing the voice” of the poor and weaker sections. “In Delhi, Manmohan and Sonia are working for real development.”

Kalahandi MP Bhakta Charan Das, who organised the Adivasi Adhikar Diwas rally, said: “With this rally, Rahul has endeared himself to the tribals. This should be a warning for Naveen Patnaik who is more a friend of corporates than poor tribals.”

Tribals to take on city life in reality show

2010-08-22T03:59:00.000-07:00

New Delhi, Aug 22 (IANS) Let alone televisions and cars, even toothbrushes are alien to some of them. Yet, eight tribal men from the interiors of Karnataka have dared to face 60 days of city life in Bangalore for a Kannada reality show, where they’ll learn a few English words and even do ramp walks.

From living isolated lives in their respective tribes, these men aged between 25 and 34 years will be slipping into jeans and wearing shirts to adapt to the Bangalore crowd for Kannada channel Suvarna’s ‘Halli Haida, Pyeteg Banda’, which means – ‘Village lad lands in the city’.

The show is a result of the success of ‘Pyete Hudgir, Halli Lifeu’ (City girl, village life), which garnered an average viewership of one million people with a maximum response from youths, explained Anup Chandrasekharan, business head of Suvarna.

‘This new show is a sequel to ‘Pyete Hudgir, Halli Lifeu’. For the first season, we took eight city girls to experience village life. But this time, we decided to bring not even village boys but tribals to the city and see how they adapt themselves here,’Chandrasekharan told IANS over phone from Bangalore.

According to Chandrasekharan, it costs them up to Rs.700,000-Rs.800,000 per episode to produce such a show.

The team behind the show took approximately three months to research on Karnataka tribes and have brought together contestants from tribes such as Bedar, Sholaga, Haki Pikki, Kodavas of Coorg, Kurubas and others.

‘Our research teams went to various parts of Karnataka and went into the interiors to look for these boys. It used to be very difficult because even the closest shop to their place of stay used to be 25-30 km away.

‘It was also extremely tough to convince them, their parents and relatives. In fact, there is going to be one guy on the show whose wife is pregnant, and by the time he goes back to his tribe, she would have delivered their child. Still he has come to see what a city looks like,’ Chandrasekharan revealed.

‘Most of them have not seen a TV, a car, a mobile phone. And they don’t even use something as basic as a toothbrush or toothpaste. Here we will try introducing them to many new things,’ he said.

The eight tribal contestants will be put up at a huge house in Bangalore and will be teamed with one city girl each. The girls will mentor them through their transformation and the contestants will be eliminated one by one in subsequent weeks, depending on their performance.

‘We plan to have ramp walk contests, change their dressing style, teach them a few English words – and it should be interesting to see how a person who has lived all his life in a remote place adapts to the city atmosphere. ‘

The winner will get a ‘cash compensation’, but the amount hasn’t been decided yet.

‘Halli Haida, Pyeteg Banda’ will be on air starting Monday and will be hosted by two-time Filmfare award winning Kannada actress Radhika Pandit.

Chandrasekharan says Kannada channels have for long been dominated by fictional content but now there’s a new space for reality shows and the audiences are lapping it up.

Orissa slams panel allegations

2010-08-19T22:18:00.001-07:00

New Delhi, Aug 20 : An incenced Orissa government has protested “derogatory” remarks made by an expert committee that accused it of collusion with India’s third-largest conglomerate, Vedanta, in recommending the denial of mining leases in that state’s Niyamgiri Hills.

The protest, sent a day after the report written by four-member team led by N.C. Saxena, a member of the National Advisory Council (of which Congress chief Sonia Gandhi is chairperson), was conveyed through a letter written on Tuesday to the secretary of the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF).

“It is shocking to note that the Saxena Committee has preferred to discuss in a derogatory manner the issues that have already been considered and adjudicated by the Hon’ble Supreme Court (in 2008),” said N. Behera, Principal secretary, Orissa government, in the letter, a copy of which is with HT.

The Orissa government has requested it be “given an opportunity” to present its views before the fate of the Vedanta project for an aluminium refinery is decided by Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh. Orissa, the letter said is “the second-best performing state in the coutry” in implementing forest rights, “finalising claims of more than two lakh tribals”.

The panel report accused both Vedanta and the state of submitting fake documentation and violations of forest, environmental and tribal-rights laws.

“It (Orissa government) has gone to the extent of forwarding false certificates and may do so again in future,” the report, submitted on Tuesday said. “The MoEF is advised not to believe the Orissa government’s contentions without independent verification.”

Vedanta Chief Operating Officer Mukesh Kumar said his firm denied all the violations. “Look at all the reports and documents the committee didn’t consider,” he said, referring to clearances submitted to SC and MoEF.

Arsenic-free water for rural India

2010-08-18T08:28:00.001-07:00

High levels of arsenic in the groundwater in areas of northeast India and Bangladesh are a recognised public health problem. However, the Isolux Technologies Division of MEL Chemicals, Inc. teamed up with an Indian engineering firm in 2009 to supply 39 arsenic treatment systems customised to the requirements of rural Indian villages.

Water supply in rural northeast areas of India and neighbouring Bangladesh is usually a single source of water for each village. Rural villagers, often lacking electric power, rely on this common village well as their only source of drinking water. If this well has a high level of arsenic, the entire village suffers. Instances of disease related to long-term arsenic exposure are relatively common.

For many years, the typical village water source was surface water (generally a lake or river). The waterborne diseases typical of untreated surface water were common. In the 1970s and 1980s, with funding from a number of international aid groups, millions of tube wells (typically of the order 100 feet deep) were drilled to provide what was thought to be a clean water source for rural villagers. Unfortunately for the villagers, in many cases one type of illness was simply traded for another. By the 1990s, it was recognised that the aquifer underlying most of northeast areas of India and neighbouring Bangladesh is high in naturally occurring arsenic. Arsenic levels in excess of 100 ppb are relatively common. The result is that millions of people in this area now exhibit the symptoms of chronic arsenic poisoning: skin lesions, neurological disorders and cancers.

Governmental agencies and various aid groups have struggled to find an adequate solution to the problem for years. Drilling deeper wells (of about 1000 feet) will avoid the arsenic contaminated aquifer, but this is too expensive and time-consuming to be a universal solution. Most of the treatment technologies common in the US are not applicable because of their relatively sophisticated control systems and occasional backwashing requirement.

The Isolux Technologies Division of MEL Chemicals, Inc. has developed Isolux technology for arsenic removal using its patented zirconium hydroxide media. MEL Chemicals, Inc. has been producing zirconium chemicals at its facility in Flemington, NJ for over 50 years. In combination with its British affiliate, MEL Chemicals, Ltd, it is the world's largest producer of zirconium chemicals. In addition to being NSF Standard 61 certified, Isolux technology has a number of advantages that make it a possible solution for rural villages in India: (1) it does not require backwashing or ‘fluffing' of the media bed; (2) it does not use any external controls; (3) all of its systems are designed around a cartridge replacement concept (cartridges can easily be replaced by an unskilled person in less than an hour); and (4) Isolux's 20-gpm unit which holds four arsenic removal cartridges appears to be an ideal size for most village wells.

In late 2008, the Indian State of Bihar awarded a contract to DNA Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd (an Indian engineering company) for arsenic treatment systems for a number of rural villages. DNA Infrastructure approached Isolux to provide their 20-gpm units for this project. Between the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009, a total of 39 rural villages in the Indian state of Bihar were provided with an arsenic-free drinking water source using Isolux technology combined with a solar-electric powered well pump.

Despite years of effort and many projects including that described here, the problem of arsenic contaminated groundwater in northeast India and Bangladesh remains one of the world's most severe public health crises. As a US company, MEL Chemicals has found that it is almost impossible to independently develop and implement projects in India or in most Asian countries. Differences in language, customs and business practices are very difficult to surmount, particularly when dealing with a relatively new technology such as arsenic adsorption. The key to success is to find a local partner such as DNA Infrastructure who can provide the bridge to successfully resolve the problem.

Over 50 tribal students fall ill due to food poisoning

2010-08-17T22:02:00.001-07:00

SURAT: More than 50 students of an ashramshala at Gavan village of Uchhal taluka in Tapi district had diarrhoea and also vomited on Tuesday afternoon due to food poisoning.

Health officials said the incident occurred after the students consumed milk served to them around 3 pm.

The students in different age groups were rushed to community health centre (CHC) at Uchhal and were given treatment for diarrhoea and vomiting. The school authorities informed the health officials around 3.30 pm about the condition of sick students.

"The students are out of danger. We are giving necessary treatment to them. New cases are still coming and therefore the number of affected students could go up from 50," said Paul Gamit, epidemic medical officer of Tapi.

The affected students are tribals and residents of nearby villages around Gavan. The health authorities are yet to find out the exact cause behind food poisoning.

"We have collected the samples of milk and water from the ashramshala and sent them for tests. The milk was from a reputed dairy and chlorinated water is used in the school," said Gamit.

Tribals to get 26% share from mining profits: Govt

2010-08-16T04:39:00.000-07:00

Government on Monday gave an assurance in the Rajya Sabha that tribals would be given 26 per cent share from mining profits and full justice would be done to them if mining activities take place in their area.
A GoM has been constituted in June for considering the draft Mines and Minerals Bill, 2010, Mines Minister B K Handique said during Question Hour.
He said the bill would ensure that issues relating to ecological balance are kept in mind while carrying out mining activities, mainly in tribal areas.
"Justice would be done to tribal population, though the matter is still with the GoM. Tribals would be given share from mining profits. We have earmarked 26 per cent share from mining profits for them," the minister said.
He said the draft bill has been prepared on the basis of policy directions in the National Mineral Policy, 2008, and Hoda Committee recommendations after consultations with the stakeholders.
Major issues laid down in the policy include making the regulatory mechanism more conducive to technology and investment flows, ensuring transparency in the concession process, and strengthening the role of Geological Survey of India and Indian Bureau of Mines.

Kerala tribals want their lands back, plan protest rallies

2010-08-13T00:27:00.000-07:00

Kurumthala Rangamoopan, in his late 70s, stands behind his hut at Kalkandiyoor in Attappady, Kerala’s largest tribal habitat, and points to vast stretches of land that once belonged to his tribesmen.

They moved out in the late 1930s when the British, who were then ruling India, proposed a hydroelectric project at the confluence of the Bhavani and Siruvani rivers there.

“We were told the electricity would burn us. Our people fled our ooru (village) of more than 130 acres and literally huddled at this place nearby, where now 70 families continue to live,” said Rangamoopan.

The hydel power project never took off. In its place instead is the Sugarcane Breeding Institute Research Centre, a unit of the Indian Council of Agriculture Research.

“Our land was usurped by people who came from outside after the British left and in 1995, part of that land was given by the government for setting up the sugar company. We were promised land in return but to this date that has not happened,” Rangamoopan said.

The alienation of tribals, or indigenous people, is a fallout of the development thrust. The displacement of a vast number of people by large commercial projects has led to armed struggles in several parts of the country. Attappady is no different.

On 9 August—declared by the UN as the International Day of the World’s Indigenous People—groups of tribal organizations met at Palakkad and decided to conduct protest marches to demand their land back. They also plan to approach the Union and state governments to seek a survey in Attappady so their tribal land can be identified and restored to them, said K.A. Ramu, an activist with Thambu, a non-profit working for the welfare of indigenous people.

“The monstrosity of this alienation will become clear only then,” said M. Sukumaran, secretary of the Attappady Samrakshna Samiti, another non-profit at the front of agitations seeking the restoration of tribal land to its original inhabitants.

Attappady, spread over 745 sq. km. in Palakkad district, had a 91% population of indigenous people in the 1950s, but this has shrunk to 41% with settlers flooding in from neighbouring Tamil Nadu and parts of central Kerala over the years, according to the Attappady Hills Area Development Society, a government body formed for eco-restoration and social development in the area.

Still, at least a third of the 90,000 people in the area are tribals.

Sukumaran has also been at the forefront of protests against the sale of tribal land in Attappady to Suzlon Energy Ltd in 2007 for a windmill farm—a move that has mobilized tribal people in the area to demand all their land back. A Pune firm, Sarjan Realities Ltd, had arranged 224 acres, including 50 acres of forest land, for Suzlon’s project, said Sukumaran.

He alleged the tribals were cheated of their land receipts by some government officials on the pretext of arranging new farming activity on their properties. These receipts were later used for making land ownership documents and the properties were eventually sold to Sarjan, he claimed.

A spokesperson for Suzlon denied comment saying the matter is in court and cannot be discussed. Sarjan could not be reached.

Based on a public hearing on the issue late July, district collector K.V. Mohankumar submitted a report on the land deal to the state government stating that a preliminary inquiry revealed forged documents. “There has been a surge of land deals between 2006 and 2008 (involving private parties) which needs to be probed. My report has recommended a high-level detailed inquiry across Attappady,” said Mohankumar.

The Kerala government has authorized the chief secretary to probe the matter. “Once the report is got, the government will initiate action,” said A.K. Balan, the state minister of backward and scheduled communities as well as electricity. The report will be ready in a month, he said.

Under Kerala’s Tribal Land Act of 1975, tribal land can be sold only to other tribals. In mid-1980s, the Supreme Court had asked state governments to cancel all tribal land transactions with non-tribals that were finalized after 1986.

No action has been taken on this yet, said Sukumaran.

“The windmill land deal is just a tip of the iceberg,” said Murugan V.S. from Anakkaty, who has with him a 1995 order from the revenue divisional officer directing five people to restore to him 12 acres of his ancestral land. “But till date, neither my father nor his brother has got possession of the land,” said Murugan. “Though there have been a few instances of threat(s) to my life, I will continue my fight.”

How a tribal boy becomes a dreaded Naxalite

2010-08-11T22:28:00.000-07:00

HYDERABAD: A 120km journey from the port city of Vishakapatnam on the highest broad gauge railway line through hills, lush green valleys, dales and waterfalls takes you to Araku Valley, one of the least known tourist places in India. For holidayers — mostly from coastal Andhra Pradesh and Kolkata — the valley offers breathtaking views. And although the Andhra Pradesh government is trying hard to promote tourism here, it's doubtful if the plans will ever succeed: Araku is on the edge of Maoist territory.

The railway line descends soon after Araku straight into "liberated zone" in Orissa and enters Chhattisgarh. There are no Maoist attacks in or around Araku but the rebels treat this as fertile ground for new recruits. "This is also tribal territory and although the ultras have been driven out of AP, the Maoist leadership is still in the hands of Telugus. So, the natural tendency for them is to keep contact with their homeland and look for new recruits from here," says Soumya Mishra, DIG (Vishakhapatnam range).

The Maoist mode of recruitment makes for a fascinating exercise in human resource development. In the beginning, the Maoists visit villages on a familiarisation trip: How poor is the village? Are there disgruntled elements? Are their local disputes? In the second stage, they start solving local problems. Most villages are remote, with little or no trace of administration.

"If, say, an epidemic like malaria breaks out, the Maoists are the first to reach there with medicines," says another police officer. It's with such fervour that they enlist the support of the villagers, which then allows them to identify "sympathisers" — youth who can be indoctrinated with the ideology of violence.

In the next stage, the sympathisers and disgruntled elements are roped in for odd jobs like carrying food articles and raw material for the rebels. The Maoists also try to get recruits to commit some offences like cutting trees and blocking roads or damage government property like post offices. The idea is to make them fugitives from the law," says DIG Mishra.

In the next stage, if a recruit shows promise, he is inducted into 'dalam' or local guerrilla squad (comprising up to 15 members each), trained to handle weapons, and made to commit a major offence. "From the time of his indoctrination, it would be two years before a recruit is allowed to commit a major offence," says IG Santosh Mehra.

Although Maoists visit villages, hold meetings and offer revolutionary messages, analysts say that the people who join them are mostly those with personal problems: Failed love affairs, escaping loan sharks or plain unemployed. "They are more like baghis (bandits) who joined the dacoits in Chambal," said one Hyderabad-based analyst.

Not everyone who joins the rebels is likely to remain one. Cops say there are many who find the romance shattered — being permanently on the run psyches them out. They return and surrender to the police seeking a normal life. Others, however, progress further: from dalam to platoon (25-30 members), and then to company which is 1,000 strong.

A few years ago, there were no Maoist companies. But recruitment has increased. More, when Maoists move in formations of 1,000 they can't go undetected. This can only denote their total dominance over an area where it does not matter whether they are found out or not. "But this happens in Orissa and Chattisgarh and not AP," says IG Mehra.

Vishakapatnam, North Telangana regions of Adilabad, and the tribal territory on the border with Gadhchiroli in Maharashtra are places the Maoists make recruitments from. Interestingly,
the Maoists, for the last few years, have not struck in their catchment areas: The idea is to use these places as safe havens and not attract attention of the police.

The radical Left wing movement began in Srikakulam (100 km from Vishakapatnam) almost simultaneously with the Naxalbari uprising led by Charu Majumdar in 1967. They spread towards Telangana, hundreds of kilometres away from Srikakulam, after a failed attempt by the locals to get a separate state of Telangana state in 1969-71.

Over the years, the quality of recruits has fallen — particularly since 1991 and the onset of liberalisation. Educated youth, with more opportunities for employment, are no longer attracted to the Maoist ideology. It's a curious turn that Maoism has taken: Once a preserve of educated youth, today it depends on the support of underprivileged tribals.

India probes tribal woman 'forced to walk naked'

2010-08-11T07:48:00.001-07:00

By Subir Bhaumik

Members of India's tribal community often complain of persecution

The Women's Commission in the Indian state of West Bengal has announced an inquiry into allegations that a tribal woman was forced to parade naked.

Officials say she was was forced to walk without her clothes for nearly 10km (6.2 miles) through three villages and was filmed on a mobile phone.
They say that she was also molested and jeered by a large crowd.
Locals say she was being "punished" because of an illicit love affair with a man from a different community.
A similar thing happened to another woman three years ago in the neighbouring state of Assam.
'Shocking incident' "Our team will visit the village of Masra - in the Birbhum district of West Bengal - and speak to the tribal woman concerned. We want the offenders brought to book," West Bengal Commission for Women Chairperson Malini Bhattacharya told the BBC.

She said that the main effort of the enquiry will be to find out why the woman's family maintained ''such a long silence" and how the local administration "remained oblivious of such a shocking incident".
Ms Bhattacharya said Birbhum district Police Superintendent Humayun Kabir had been asked to submit a detailed report to the Women's Commission.
Critics say that it was only after mobile phone clips of the girl went into wide circulation that the police swung into action.
Six of the men who allegedly molested her have been arrested.
The West Bengal Human Rights Commission (WBHRC) has also asked the district police for a report into the incident within a month.
"If we are not satisfied with this report, we will do our own investigation and submit recommendations to the government," WBHRC Chairman Narayan Chandra Seal said.
What has especially upset many is the involvement of locally powerful local people - alongside schoolboys - in the incident.
The village council chief, Mangal Baske, said he did not report the incident to police because of "pressure from the villagers".
"Moreover, the problem died down soon afterwards and the girl's family didn't want me to do anything," he said.
Meanwhile the victim of the alleged attack is being kept, along with her father, in police quarters at Rampurhat for "protection and questioning".
"We are not letting her return to her village just yet because we fear that she might be hounded by villagers again," police spokesman Bidhan Roy said.

Miners will have to give tribals a share

2010-08-10T22:01:00.001-07:00

NEW DELHI: Mining companies in tribal areas should shell out 26% of their equity while individual and other operators should share 26% of their profits with the affected people. The Union mines ministry will recommend this to the Empowered Group of Ministers on the new Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act on Wednesday.

The EGoM will meet for the last time on Wednesday to discuss the bill which the government believes can reduce the rising protest in tribal areas against mining that brings little developmental gains to the region.

Sources said the proposed bill's provisions for sharing equity and profits besides the mining units paying an environmental levy and other taxes in order to check abnormal super profits as well as run the operation sustainability remain on board despite a spirited attempt by business chamber FICCI against them.

FICCI had written to the PM against the provisions of the bill. It had claimed that sharing their profits with affected people "would be like money earned without any effort" and lead to greater inequalities and cause socio-economic problems besides making the mining industry operations unviable.

But the government, conscious of the geographical overlap of the tribal population, Left-wing extremism and the mining belt in central India, sources suggest, at the moment is sticking to its guns.

The bill also proposes to set up a regulatory authority at the Centre to monitor and implement the Act. The move to set up such an authority comes at a time when the case of illegal mining in Karnataka has become a national issue with a beleaguered BJP government in the state tossing the ball into the Union government's court. It has asked the Centre to ban iron ore exports which it turn would curb illegal mining too.

While the UPA at the moment seems firm on altering the mining regulations, it is a divided house on the issue of curbing or banning exports. The Union minister of mines B K Handique on Tuesday said a ban on the export of the ore would lead to job loss. The Union steel ministry, on the other hand, has favoured a ban on exports of iron ore fines. The EGoM meeting on Wednesday is expected to resolve this impasse as well.

Handique admitted in Lok Sabha during question hour that there were differing views but said, "My ministry has, however, kept an open mind and whatever decision is taken, we shall abide by it."

Through the land of tribes

2010-08-07T22:26:00.001-07:00

Usha Shetty
When you disclose that your going on a holiday to a place like Chhattisgarh, reactions more often range from 'what is that?' to 'where is it?' or a faraway look with brows knit, trying to jog dubious memory, followed by a 'But what can you do there?'

It’s a place that creates umpteen memorable memories. As our group of seven discovered, the picturesque state has much to offer every kind of traveller. Endowed with natural beauty Chhattisgarh was created in the year 2000 by carving out the southeastern chunk of Madhya Pradesh. Excellent roads, toll plazas, glitzy lights, shopping malls — the two bigger cities, Raipur and Durg (home to the Bhilai Steel Plant) proved a revelation to the likes of us with a stereotyped notion of what the word ‘urban’ means in relation to a place like central India. Chhattisgarh is not only blessed with large forest cover but also with huge mineral deposits which has lead to creation of mines like the Bailadila iron ore mine, leading to a flourishing mineral industry. As much as it the place lives in the present, it is also rooted in its past. All of Chhattisgarh or the former Dakshin Koshal (Lord Rama is said to have spent part of his exile here), abounds in ancient temples and is a historian’s delight — like the Rajiv Lochan Temple in Rajim or one of the Shaktipeethas, the revered Maa Danteshwari in Bastar district’s Dantewara (where Sati’s tooth reportedly fell) at the confluence of the Dankini and Shankini rivers (plenty of exotic names here). The Bastar Dussehra, one of the biggest festivals of the state, has nothing to do with Lord Rama but is devoted to Maa Danteshwari, venerated by both the tribals and Hindus. What’s more interesting is that from an architectural point of view, the 10 to 12 centuries old Bhoramdeo temple, we were surprised to discover, served as the template for the famed Khajuraho temple. Its beautiful setting amidst forests and rivers and the intricate erogenous sculptures, also to be found in the nearby Madwa Mahal temple, made it one of the most memorable spots to visit. History is alive in Sirpur (also known as Shripur), once the capital of the South Koshal kingdom, and now scattered with temples and monuments. The spaciously laid out 7th century Laxman Temple is one of the country’s most exceptional brick temples. An important centre of Buddhism, Sirpur was visited by Chinese scholar Hieun Tsang in the 7th century. The Gandheshwar Temple, with the majestic Mahanadi as its backdrop, is interesting but badly maintained. More distressing was the fact that a younger, “educated” generation — students from a neighbouring college — had just wound up a picnic there with scant regard for cleanliness or sanctity of the place. In contrast, is the relatively well-kept and quaintly named Deorani-Jethani Temple at Talagaon. The towering eight-ton Rudrashiva statue here is one of a kind, with various parts of its anatomy represented by different animals and faces. Yet another unusually named shrine is the Mama-Bhanja Temple in Bastar near the twin Ganeshas of Barsur, said to be the largest statue of Ganesha in Asia to be carved out of a single rock. We made two forays into neighbouring Madhya Pradesh. One to the holy Amarkantak, the source of the river Narmada and the river Sone. The Narmada temple here pleases with its pristine whiteness. So do the Kapil Dhara falls nearby, where Sage Kapila is said to have tried to stop the sprightly Narmada, wanting her to remain in Amarkantak. The whole outing entailed a drive through the Achanakmar Wildlife Sanctuary. A surprise bonus was the visit to Kanha National Park, but we were disappointed as we did not spot any animals. Bastar’s Kanger Valley National Park too didn’t oblige but gave us a glimpse of the Bastar Myna, the state bird. Deep inside its enchanting virgin forests, we crawled into the Kutumbsar Caves with their stalactite and stalagmite formations. Beautiful to behold were the Tirathgarh Falls, formed by the Kanger River cascading down 300 ft, with scores of monkeys to beware of, all the way down the steps leading to the bottom of the falls. Tribal culture The waterfalls that impressed the most were Chitrakot Falls near Jagdalpur, reported to be the largest waterfalls in India. The river Indravati descends from a gracefully curved horseshoe shaped cliff (as wide as 1000 feet during monsoon, comparisons with the Niagara are inevitable) into a huge, 100 ft-deep basin that proves ideal for boating. The sight of the falls lit up at night amidst the surrounding darkness added a magical touch to the experience. Another unforgettable experience was a dance by some young members of the Baiga tribe, illuminated by a bonfire and aided by the car’s headlights (payment for the dance is three bags of rice!). Equally interesting was a stopover at a tribal haat in Bastar and interacting with tribals at various places. Chhattisgarh is home to some of India’s oldest tribes; some in Bastar are said to be over 10,000 years old. At the other end of the spectrum was a visit to one of Chhattisgarh’s royal houses, the gracefully built palace of Kawardha (now partly a heritage hotel) and a meeting with Prince Yogeshwar Raj Singh. An early morning ride around Raipur with all of us squeezed into a single phatphatiya; the numerous wayside dhabas that offered not only fresh, hot, good food but also great hospitality — my personal favourite; the tiny Sahu’s at Mahasamund, which had some out-of-the-world parathas and lassi was memorable (it constantly amazed us South Indians how universal the idli and dosa had become, featuring on the menu at most of these places). For those who’ve never set foot in Chhattisgarh, we cannot emphasise further the joy of holidaying there at least once in a lifetime. Travel tips *Connectivity: By train — Well linked to all major cities in India By air — Raipur is connected to Mumbai, Nagpur and Delhi. By road — NH6 & NH43 run though the state. Nagpur, Vishakhapatnam, Jabalpur and Ranchi are among the cities closest to it in the surrounding states.

“Avatar” actors join protest in support of Orissa tribals

2010-07-28T22:55:00.000-07:00

Hasan Suroor

AFP Protesters dressed as 'Na Vi' from James Cameron's film "Avatar" take part in a demonstration as British mining giant Vedanta holds its annual general meeting in London on Wednesday. Photo: AFP

Rights activists, including actors from James Cameron’s film Avatar that highlights the threat to environment, held a protest outside the venue of the annual general meeting of the mining company Vedanta here on Wednesday against its controversial plans to mine tribal land in Orissa regarded sacred by Dongria Konds.

Some protesters wore blue face paint in an echo of Avatar’s portrayal of the destruction of an “alien’’ tribe.

Carrying placards and raising slogans in support of Dongria Konds, campaigners from Foil Vedanta and Survival International called for Prime Minister David Cameron to take up the issue with Indian leaders during his talks in New Delhi.

In a statement, Foil Vedanta said the company was launched on the London Stock Exchange in December 2003 “with the help of Britain’s Department of Trade and Industry and the Department for International Development ‘’ even as several leading British organisations had divested their holdings in the company.

“A number of British shareholders, including the Church of England and the Rowntrees Foundation, have over the last year divested their holdings in Vedanta plc,’’ it said accusing the company of flouting environmental laws.

Survival International’s director Stephen Corry said the story of Avatar was ``being played out in the hills of Niyamgiri in Orissa’’.

"Like the Na’vi of Avatar, the Dongria Kondh are also at risk, as their lands are set to be mined by Vedanta Resources. The mine will destroy the forests on which the Dongria Kondh depend and wreck the lives of thousands of other Kondh tribal people living in the area,’’ he said

Tripura provides more power to tribal council

2010-07-28T04:47:00.001-07:00

Tripura has decided to hand over seven more departments to the tribal autonomous district council as part of efforts to provide more autonomy to tribals, a minister said here Wednesday.

'Earlier we had given five departments to the TTAADC (Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council). Now we have decided to give seven more to the autonomous body,' Tripura Tribal Welfare Minister Aghore Debbarma told reporters.

'The Left Front government has been committed to all round socio-economic development of tribals,' he said. Tribals constitute one third of Tripura's 3.5 million population.

The politically important TTAADC was formed under the sixth schedule of the Indian Constitution in 1985.

The TTAADC is the most powerful self-governing body among the existing 16 autonomous district councils (ADCs) in northeast India facilitating the socio-economic development of tribals, who make up 27 percent of the region's total population of around 40 million.

Of the 16 ADCs, six are in Manipur, three each in Assam, Meghalaya and Mizoram and one in Tripura. In Manipur, tribals have been protesting for the past few months demanding more power to the six tribal autonomous district councils in the northeastern state.

Debbarma said the 12 departments handed over to the TTAADC in Tripura include education, health, agriculture, fisheries, animal resource development, social welfare, social forestry, cultural affairs, cooperative (partial) and panchayat (partial).

The ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led Left Front stormed back to power in the 30-seat TTAADC last month for the second consecutive term.

Tribals have been on a series of movements, including road blockades, in Manipur since April 14 demanding more financial and administrative powers for the six ADCs. The stir was led by the tribal student and youth organisation All Naga Students' Association, Manipur (ANSAM).

The Manipur government conducted elections to the six ADCs in May despite protests from tribals. The ruling Congress won in all six.

Hybrid seeds for five tribal dists

2010-07-27T22:27:00.001-07:00

JAIPUR: In a first-of-its kind initiative, the state government is supplying hybrid seeds to five tribal districts in the state in a bid to improve productivity. The initiative, taken under public private partnership (PPP) mode, has been christened Golden Rays and is aimed at enhanced crop management and increased market linkages.

According to sources, about 4,000 villages in the districts of Banswara, Udaipur, Dungarpur, Pratapgarh and Sirohi have been provided hybrid corn seeds this season free of cost. "These villages are tribal dominated. They have neither heard nor used hybrid seeds in their lifetime. They practice extremely primitive way of agriculture and have been using ordinary home saved seeds. The idea is to expose them to the hybrid variety even if it is on a small patch of land so as to help them improve their productivity and hence their income," officials in the agriculture department revealed.

The government has tied up with Monsanto Imagine, a leading global provider of technology-based agricultural products aimed to improve farm productivity and food quality, for the purpose. Mosanato has also entered into similar agreements with the government of Karnataka and Gujarat.

"Rajasthan is the largest state in India with a geographical area of 34.2 million hectare. Sixty-six per cent of the population of the state is dependent on agriculture. Rajasthan with 10.35 lakh hectares and accounts for 15% of total corn acreage of India of which only 30% is under high yielding seeds. The average yield of corn in Rajasthan is just 12.4 quintals per hectare as compared to India average yield of 19.4 quintals per hectare," he said.

A total of about 4,000 MT of hybrid corn seed has been distributed to 8 lakh families of which 7 lakh are tribals and rest BPL. "The Dekalb high yielding hybrids have been effective for the agro-ecological climate of Rajasthan.

Project Golden Rays is a project in which high quality Dekalb Corn Hybrid Seeds are distributed among farmers of tribal areas along with a season-long package of promotional support,"officials said.

India's top policy forum meets Saturday amid farm sector woes

2010-07-22T05:36:00.001-07:00

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will Saturday preside over a meeting of the National Development Council (NDC), the country's top policy forum, for a mid-term review of the 11th Five Year Plan (2007-12) amid serious concerns over the performance of the farm sector.

The meeting, the council's 55th since its inception Aug 6, 1952, comes against the backdrop of a major drop in the contribution of the country's farm sector, which employs nearly two-thirds of the workforce, to below 15 percent of India's gross domestic product for the first time ever last fiscal.

Ahead of the crucial meeting, to be attended by all chief ministers, members of the Planning Commission and key members of the central cabinet, a discussion paper prepared by the plan panel identified five specific areas of constraints.

Besides agriculture, the other four areas of concern highlighted were: Management of water resources, power generation targets, issues of urbanization and specific problems of tribal development.

'This note draws attention to problems in some selected areas which not only call for mid-course correction, but also identifies constraints that are important for Twelfth Five Year Plan,' said the paper, a copy of which was obtained by IANS.

At the outset, the discussion paper conceded that the target of 4-percent growth in agriculture will not be achievable, given the expansion of farm output of a mere 0.2 percent last fiscal and 1.6 percent a year ago.

Among the measures, the paper suggested a sharp cut in the taxes on agriculture produce to less than 1 percent, better cooperative credit, crop diversification, better seeds, soil-based nutrients and more water.

The paper also identified availability and management of water as a challenge in equal measure, especially for agriculture that uses 78 percent of this resource, and called for major reforms in the irrigation system and use of groundwater.

Even in the case of electricity generation, the paper says the target of 78,000 mw will be unlikely to be met, with additional capacity generation of around 62,000 mw, calling for measures such as reduction in transmission losses.

'If the economy is to move to a higher growth path of 9-10 percent in the 12th Plan, we have to aim at even faster expansion in power generation in the years ahead,' the discussion paper said.

The paper also sought to warn that urban poverty will be another major problem that the country will face. Already some 350 million people live in urban areas, and remain underserved by utilities, and the number will double in 25 years.

'The very realisation of the ambitious goal of 9-10 percent growth in gross domestic product (GDP) will itself depend on making Indian cities more liveable, inclusive, competitive and sustainable,' said the paper.

The note by the plan panel also said that the country's tribals, who account for 8.2 percent of the population had not benefited adequately from India's development.

Taking literacy as a yardstick, the paper said while this measure of human development had increased from 8.53 percent in 1961 to 47.1 percent now, the gap with the general population was still high at 18 percentage points.

It said even though the tribal sub-plan incorporated into the planning process was an important instrument for flow of adequate funds for such areas, the implementation had not been satisfactory, both at the central and state levels.

The paper also sought to link the lack of adequate development in tribal areas to left-wing extremism by quoting Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's budget speech in February where he promised coordinated steps in 33 such affected districts.

Accordingly, the paper said, the plan panel has initiated a consultative process to prepare an action plan that will address a range of development and security measures, with an assurance of adequate funding by the finance ministry.

The prime minister had also said last week that developmental issues in Maoist-affected states will be discussed in greater detail in the NDC meeting and that the state of affairs in tribal areas needed to be changed.

'For far too long have our tribal brothers and sisters seen the administration in the form of a rapacious forest guard, a brutal policeman, a greedy patwari (revenue official). It is time that we provided a better delivery of service and one which is sensitive,' he said.

The 11th Five Year Plan was approved by the NDC Dec 19, 2007 with an outlay of Rs.36.44 trillion ($910 billion at the then exchange rate) with the central theme - 'Towards Faster and More Inclusive Growth'.

(Rana Ajit can be reached at rana.ajit@ians.in mailto:rana.ajit@ians.in and biz@ians.in)

Skewed growth to blame for rise of Naxals: SC

2010-07-20T22:51:00.000-07:00

NEW DELHI: This is the worst that the government could have ever got from the Supreme Court.

Terming the developmental policies as "blinkered", the apex court has said that the promised rights and benefits never reached marginalised citizens fuelling extreme discontent and giving birth to naxalism and militancy, which are threatening the sovereignty of the country.

Referring to largescale displacement of tribals from forest land in the name of mining and development, the SC said non-settlement of their rights and non-provision for timely compensation of their lost land has created the worst kind of hatred among them towards development, possibly giving birth to extremism.

"To millions of Indians, development is a dreadful and hateful word that is aimed at denying them even the source of their sustenance," a Bench comprising Justices Aftab Alam and B S Chauhan said on Monday.

"It is cynically said that on the path of `maldevelopment' almost every step that we take seems to give rise to insurgency and political extremism which along with terrorism are supposed to be the three gravest threats to India's integrity and sovereignty," it said.

The anguish of the apex court brimmed over when it dealt with a case relating to acquisition of tribal land by Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd in Sundergarh district of Orissa, which is a Maoist hotbed, and found that those who lost their land were not paid compensation for 23 years.

This extreme example of governmental apathy shook the conscience of a Bench forcing it to ask a series of questions -- "Why is the state's perception and vision of development at such great odds with the people it purports to develop? And why are their rights so dispensable? Why do India's GDP and human development index (which is based broadly using measures of life expectancy, adult literacy and standard of living) present such vastly different pictures?"

It said: "With the GDP of $1.16 trillion (of 2008) Indian economy is 12th largest in US dollar terms and it is the second fastest growing economy in the world. But according to the Human Development Report 2009 (published by UNDP), the HDI for India is 0.612 which puts it at 134th place among 182 countries."

It said the counter argument was that very often the process of development that most starkly confirms the fears expressed by Dr Ambedkar, who had said though politically one man had one vote of equal value, in social life one continues to deny one man one value.

Justice Alam, writing the judgment for the Bench, said this was because despite the philanthropist approach of entrepreneurs and governmental efforts the human factor in the most mineral rich areas have not been able to solve their displacement from forests, despite they being called the oldest dwellers of the area.

On the yet-to be-settled rights of tribals whose land was acquired and no compensation was paid for 23 years, the Bench took assistance from Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam and counsel Janaranjan Das to frame a scheme.

Under the scheme, the Centre being the owner of Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd would determine and pay the compensation to the erstwhile landowners. The SC appointed a former judge of the Orissa HC, Justice A K Pasricha, as chairman of a commission to prepare a report on the land acquired within four months and submit a report to the apex court.

Think PESA, not paisa

2010-07-20T00:26:00.001-07:00

The Union government seems to be working at cross-purposes to tackle Left-wing extremism, which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has time and again described as the country’s biggest internal security threat. At one level, there is recognition that any solution to the complex problem cannot be confined to maintenance of law and order but must address socio-economic issues in some of the poorest districts spread across India that have large tribal populations.
At the same time, by merely pouring funds into these areas without ensuring that these are properly utilised, and, more importantly, without tackling the structural factors that have sharply widened inequalities of income and opportunities, our netas and babus in New Delhi or in state capitals would be fooling nobody but themselves if they think conditions prevailing in the “Maoist-infested” parts of India could change for the better.
On July 24, the National Development Council (NDC) meeting — headed by the Prime Minister and comprising all chief ministers, key Cabinet ministers and members of the Planning Commission — is meeting to discuss, among other things, the mid-term appraisal of the 11th Five Year Plan (April 2007 to March 2012). The NDC will also discuss a report on the special problems of tribal-dominated districts, including the 34 districts affected by Left-wing extremism. Yojana Bhavan is reportedly working on a Rs 13,000-crore special financial package for these districts.
Before the NDC meeting, the Planning Commission would do well to circulate a 47-page report entitled “PESA, Left-Wing Extremism and Governance: Concerns and Challenges in India’s Tribal Districts”, which is an independent assessment of the functioning of the Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act (or PESA), 1996, that governs tribal-dominated areas in nine states, covered by the Fifth Schedule of the Indian Constitution. The nine states are Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Rajasthan.
Earlier this year, this independent report was ham-handedly “censored” by the ministry of Panchayati Raj headed by Dr Chandra Prakash Joshi and deleted from the official “State of Panchayats Report 2008-09” which was released by Dr Singh on April 24. The ministry had commissioned this study to the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), with the aim to find out “the correlation between the promise and the reality of self-governance in selected states, especially those which have witnessed difficulties due to alternate mobilisations (and counter-mobilisations)”.
The IRMA report — authored by Ajay Dandekar and Chitrangada Choudhury and based on extensive field surveys — categorically blames government apathy, more than anything else, for the improper administration of the provisions of PESA in many tribal districts and argues that government apathy has to a large measure provided an impetus to the activities of Naxalites. The authors write: “…this may be the last opportunity…to retrieve PESA…The alternative is too horrific even to contemplate for the tribal areas”.
The report begins with a November 2009 quote from the Prime Minister: “There has been a systemic failure in giving tribals a stake in the modern economic processes that inexorably intrude into their living spaces… The systematic exploitation and social and economic abuse of our tribal communities can no longer be tolerated”.
The next quote is from Fulsingh Naik, resident of Mandibisi village, Rayagada district, Orissa, who recounts a conversation he had in December 2009 inside a prison cell with a policeman who had jailed him for leading community protests against a liquor shop: “When I told a government official that PESA allows us to determine our policy on liquor trade in the village, he shot back, ‘Are you trying to teach me the law? If you are so knowledgeable about the law, why are you living here in your village in the forest? Why don’t you go and speak in the Orissa Assembly?’”
The third quote is rhetorical: “Is the government meant for the people or the powerful?” The man who raised this often-asked question in July 2009 is Mahangu Madiya, resident of Dhuragaon village in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh, in the context of the state government’s efforts to acquire his farmland for Tata Steel, by ignoring opposition to the move by local gram sabhas.
The IRMA study has highlighted several instances where state governments have diluted the powers of PESA in the wording of legislation and the rules governing the implementation of the law. Under PESA, a special provision has been made for the functioning of panchayats in order to protect and promote the interests of tribal or indigenous communities. It points out that barring Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, most states have enacted laws that provide the bulk of the powers to the gram panchayat, and not the gram sabha which is in stark violation of Section 4(n) of PESA — a gram sabha is a body of persons registered in the electoral rolls of a village or a group of villages within the area of the panchayat. In other words, whereas the gram panchayat is a small elected body, the gram sabha includes all men and women above the age of 18 and is, therefore, a larger and more representative body.
There is much more in the report that should be carefully read by our rulers. Some of them, who seem clueless about how to deal with Naxalites, would start listening to views that do not adhere to their blinkered notion that the only way to deal with Left-wing extremism is to annihilate the last Maoist standing before building schools, health centres and roads in tribal areas, besides providing clean drinking water and electricity.
Here’s an unsolicited suggestion to Dr Singh (who has frequently travelled across the length and breadth of the globe) made by Bengaluru-based author and public intellectual Ram Guha: “Mr Prime Minister, why don’t you pay a visit to Dantewada one of these days?”

Paranjoy Guha Thakurta is an educator and commentator

Steps needed to save tigers: NGO

2010-07-11T23:52:00.001-07:00

PUNE: An exhibition of around 150 photographs showcasing India's rich heritage of biodiversity was organised by NGO Tiger Action Force at the Balgandharva Art Gallery on Sunday.

The idea was to create awareness about the International Year of Bio-Diversity being celebrated this year.

A section of photographs focused on the decline in wildlife population because of poaching and road accidents. Screening of the documentary Truth about Tigers' and lectures on wildlife conservation were also a part of the exhibition.

An attraction of the exhibition was the display of handicraft items made by tribals Mogya Handicrafts by Tiger Watch', and T-shirts made by SPROUTS, an NGO.

Gaurav Mahajan, a member of Tiger Action Force, told TOI that the photographs were taken by 17 wildlife photographers across the country.

"Immediate steps need to be taken to save the dwindling number of tigers. Through our NGO, we call upon the youth to come forward voluntarily to help protect our pride, the tiger," he said.

Members of Tiger Action Force are from all walks of life. Their interest in environment brought them together to start this NGO last year. They organise awareness programmes in educational institutes.

Mridula Vijairaghavan, a first year B Com student of Symbiosis and a member, says that incidents of wild animals killed in tiger reserves are reported all over the country. "Big animals like nil gai, tigers, leopards and even elephants are hit by running vehicles. It is all because of internal fragmentation of forests by roads and highways."

The NGO is also working to make tribals residing in forest areas self-reliant. Another member, Utpal Tongo says, "Efforts are made to help tribals be less dependent on forest produce. We are encouraging them in bamboo art and see that they get a market to sell their produce. All these tribals are from Melghat area."

Closer home, Tiger Action Force is working towards conservation and protection of the Pashan lake. Members Siddharth Pai, an engineer, and Bhagyesh Pidyar, an insurance consultant, say that they are preparing a draft on the water quality, bird count and plantation to be taken up in Pashan lake.

"With the guidance of Professor Sanjeev Nalavade, faculty at Fergusson College, we are preparing this draft, which will be submitted to the Pune Municipal Corporation. The bird count of the lake has drastically gone down because of the habitat modification in the lake," they said.

Voices in the wilderness

2010-07-03T21:54:00.000-07:00

Sevanti Ninan

Will they be heard? Tribals in Chhattisgarh.

Swara, an initiative of former journalist Shubranshu Choudhury, enables the tribals of Chhattisgarh to tell their version of stories, in their language and through a medium accessible to them…

Would things have been different in Chattisgarh today if local journalists had been able to speak to tribals living beyond the main roads? And if they had had the will to represent their problems? “When journalists don't reach them they go to the Maoists. The bridging that a journalist is supposed to do between citizens and the state does not happen because of language and distance.”

Shubranshu Choudhury, who is saying this, is a former BBC journalist with a clear belief that language is a huge issue in this state. “The Hindi speaking tribal is like an English speaker in our society: he is part of the power structure. There are two sides to this war. If a tribal knows Hindi he may be on the other side of the fight. The Hindi speaking tribal is more likely to go to Salwa Judum. The one who speaks only Gondi or Kuruk goes to the Maoists.”

Choudhury chucked up his job a few years ago to figure out how to be more relevant to people in his home state of Chhattisgarh, particularly the 33 per cent tribal population. He set up a mailing list called Chhattisgarh-net, but that goes only so far in a state where 0.7 per cent of the population has internet access. He tried to reconnect with the tribal classmates he had once had in his home state. Among the things they told him was, “your media only writes about you guys.” Some of them, he discovered, had gone over to the Maoists.

Language divide

There are no tribal journalists in the mainstream media in Chhattisgarh. The number of journalists who speak any of the tribal languages are very few. The major media in the state are owned by people with interests in coal, power and steel. That shapes how they report the public hearings that are frequently held on locating projects in a particular area. “The owner, writer, reader — they are all on the same side of this war.” Radio is the ideal medium for a state with a population scattered across a forested interior, but All India Radio has no news service in a tribal language. The Maoists, on the contrary, bring out their books and leaflets in Gondi.

So how does the government of the day get to hear from a forested belt where the language spoken is not that of the newspapers or TV channels or their reporters? Where no newspapers reach, and people have no way to draw attention to the fact that precious little development is reaching either? How do you bring them into a news net when they are many, many walking miles away from any stringer or reporter?

With not just appropriate technology but an appropriate medium. And the only medium with 50 per cent reach in this state is the mobile phone. Even poor tribals are now buying them with plans that offer a lifetime of free incoming calls.

How do you democratise journalism? By getting people to give their own news, even if the only language they speak is Gondi or Kuruk. By designing a telephone news service with moderators who will both vet incoming stories, and translate them into Hindi. So in February this year C G Swara went into operation, Choudhury's pet project evolved with help from Microsoft and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Swara is essentially a citizen journalism platform using voice xml technology which links a website to many phone lines.

Jittery government

Today the moderator, after listening and translating, decides whether the message is worth releasing or not. At the moment, on an average, they release one in three messages. The state in Chhattisgarh, given its current state of emergency, is not in a mood for new fangled communication innovations. Swara simply feeds into the paranoia of the police officials here. But a government willing to listen will have found a way of knowing the truth about what really goes on in the name of schools, a public distribution system, public hearings of intended projects, NREGA wages, the quality of village water, and much else.

Here is a sampling of small news items on the Chhattisgarh-net CG Swara website: Kushal on no results for class 5 and 8. Irregularity in PDS in Toynar Bijapur. Kamlesh on 40 haija deaths in Basaguda. Live report from public hearing in Dharmajaigarh. NREGA workers not paid from 6 months. Only teacher on census duty, children roam around. Mongra dam affected are paying bribes but yet to get compensation. Live report from public hearing for SKS power plant in Kharsia, Raigarh. Village head says 2 killed were innocent villagers, police says they were naxals. Children employed and underpaid in Tendu leaf collection. Report on SKS public hearing in Raigarh and arrest of activist Jayant Bohidar. Bijapur: Rice for poor captured by middlemen.(item in Gondi.) 236 schools closed in Bijapur district from 4 years. Interview with a person beaten up by drunk policemen.

An utterly vivid chronicle of governance in tribal regions.

All narrated in artless, barely a few sentences long narratives. The audio reports are archived on the CG Swara website where anybody can listen in. Increasingly, journalists in Chhattisgarh do. Swara's reports often give contact numbers of the officials and departments concerned, and when people tracking the website call them (as when salaries at a school were not aid for a year) a Swara report is increasingly followed by action.

When journalists in India and abroad began writing about Swara, the Chattisgarh police heard of it too, and soon the location on a Microsoft server was history. Now Swara has bounced back again with a single phone line. You dial in and it asks you whether you want to record a story or listen to one. Dial 1 or 2. That is about as complicated as it gets. The service began on February 8, and had logged 3,500 calls by the middle of May when it was discontinued briefly.

Swara has trained 33 tribals in how to give brief reports (the recording ends in two minutes) but as the phone number became known many more began to call on their own to give their urgent bit of local news. Says Choudhury “If I speak only Gondi, and if I possess only a mobile phone — no computer or internet — I can still get my news out.” In a state where those covering the war don't know the language of the other side, this service is one way to stop more disgruntled men and women from listening to the Maoists.

TRIFED – Empowering Tribals Financially

2010-07-03T21:53:00.001-07:00

BACKGROUNDER

For promoting products and skills of tribal artisans particularly in handicrafts and with the ultimate objective of increasing their incomes by creating sustainable markets, Tribal Cooperative Marketing Development Federation of India Limited (TRIFED) has been consistently expanding operations over the past few years.

Marketing Operations

TRIFED has established marketing support through 23 retail outlets titled TRIBES INDIA, an exclusive shop of tribal artifacts espousing tribal cause, at important locations of the country. In addition, there are consignment outlets at 14 places including Nathu La Pass, Leh and Goa.

Tribes India, showcases the most exquisite authentic tribal art and craft items crafted and sculpted by tribes from all over India. All products are eco-friendly, made from naturally available raw materials and are reasonably priced. At present, eight categories of products namely Tribal Textiles & Embroidery, Metal Crafts, Tribal Jewellery, Cane & Bamboo products and Stone Pottery, Tribal Paintings, Gifts & Novelties, Organic & natural products are showcased and marketed through the outlets. During the year 2009-10, around 196 new tribal art & craft items were selected for marketing which were made by tribal artisans belonging to various tribes.

The sales turnover has grown from Rs.162.56 Lakh in 2005-06 to Rs.688.20 Lakh in 2009-10.

Tribal Artisans Exhibitions

TRIFED organizes Tribal Artisans Melas (TAMs) in order to identify new artisans and empanelling them as suppliers. Such effort serves the purpose of creating sustainable livelihoods for the tribal artisans as well as ensuring steady supply chain for TRIFED. During the year 2009-10, 7 TAMs were organised in Guwahati (for North East Region), Jhabua (MP), Dharchula (Uttrakhand), Chalansari (HP), Ranchi (Jharkhand), Ahmedabad (Gujarat) and Udaipur (Rajasthan) in which 304 artisans of 14 States participated.

TRIFED also organizes exhibitions known as ‘Aadishilp’ for providing platform to tribal artisans for marketing of their products. During the year 2009-10 such exhibitions were organized in New Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Bhopal, Shimla, Amritsar, Jullandhar and Lucknow in which 576 artisans from various States participated to sell their products. Total sales registered in these exhibitions were Rs.162.57 lakh.

In 2009-10, TRIFED in partnership with Ministry of Culture, mobilized participation of tribal artisans from North-Eastern States in four OCTAVEs (an exhibition event involving artisans of eight North Estates States) at Surat, Lucknow, Amritsar and Kolkata in which 93 tribal artisans participated.

Role As Canalising Agency

TRIFED is the sole canalizing agency in the country for exports of Gum Karaya since 1989. The exports increased to Rs. 22.83 crores in the year 2009-10 as against Rs. 19.90 crore of the previous year, thus showing an increase of 15%.

Training

For skill upgradation and capacity building, training is imparted to Minor Forest Produce (MFP) gatherers and tribal artisans. These include training to Mahua flower gatherers, Gum pickers, Honey collectors, Lac cultivators and tribal women SHGs on Leaf Cup & Plate (Dona-pattal) making.

Training is also being imparted to Handicraft Artisans where it organizes Primary Level Training (PLT), Advance Level Training (ALT) and Design Workshop Training (DWT). In PLT, tribals are imparted training to produce the craft items while in ALT some advance techniques are taught to those tribals who are showing good performance in PLTs. Further in DWT only empanelled suppliers of TRIFED are chosen and lessons of market oriented designs are taught to them.

Research And Development

TRIFED has taken up Research and Development projects on value addition of Mahuwa Flower, Sal oil, Sal de-oil cake, fermentation for utilization of Forest based products and also development of post-harvest technology for storage and value addition of selected Minor Forest Produces (MFPs). The idea is that if TRIFED can get the value-added products made through R&D activities and bring about commercial production of the same, then the prices of the raw material i.e. MFP shall automatically increase as per the market forces. This will result in getting better prices for the tribals than they were getting earlier.

During the year 2009-10, six Research and Development projects were initiated through six different Research Institutions in consultation with IIT, Delhi at a budgetary outlay of Rs.94.60 Lakh.

New Initiatives

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs has signed an MOU with the Nation’s premier fashion institute – NIFT to improve designs of the tribals art and craft items and establish TRIBES INDIA as a brand and with National Literacy Mission Authority, Department of Adult Education (Ministry of HRD) to bring the tribals artisans being trained by the Jan Shikha Sansthan, into fold of TRIFED’s marketing operations.

New showrooms at GPO Mumbai and Indore are underway. Besides. institutional arrangement has been made with specialized Government agencies of North-Eastern Region States for supply of ethnic tribal arts and crafts items to TRIBES India.

Special preparation is on the way for the Common Wealth Games season. This includes identification of about 100 specific products for sales during the Common Wealth season through its three showrooms in Delhi and Special Handicraft Shop at Games Village. For the identified products, the supply line is being strengthened.

Identification is on for more number of individual tribal artisans, SHGs/NGOs and grass-root agencies involved in tribal products so as to bring them into the supply line of TRIFED, through its various Regional Offices across the country.

Specific thrust is being given on training and skill upgradation of the tribal artisans in a systematic manner through NIFT so as to improve the product designs.

Preparation is on for customized special promotional publicity materials. (PIB Features)

*Inputs from the Ministry of Tribal Affairs

Hills show way forward for tribals

2010-06-26T23:41:00.001-07:00

S A Aiyar

So you think that Indian tribals are utterly downtrodden, oppressed and bypassed by national economic development? You think activists are right to view Maoist insurgency as a tribal blessing and the only way forward for such an oppressed group?

Think again. No less than 17.1% of tribals own colour TVs, 46.6% have bicycles, 20% have two-wheelers, 12.5% have life insurance and 8.5% have refrigerators. That is below the national average of course, but nothing like the stark deprivation painted by activists.

These startling figures come from Caste in a Different Mould by Rajesh Shukla, Sunil Jain and Preeti Kakkar. The book draws on major household surveys by the National Council on Applied Economic Research, especially one in 2004-05. Its main finding is that caste matters much less than people think, while education and location matter much more.

That is good news. The OBCs (other backward castes) show no sign of suffering from discrimination — their income and durables ownership shares are roughly in line with population share. The share of dalits and tribals is below the national average, but not nearly as far below as activists and Maoists would have you believe.

India's average annual household income in 2004-05 was Rs 65,041. Upper caste households averaged Rs 86,690, higher than the national average but not dramatically so. Tribals averaged Rs 40,753, lower than the national average but not dramatically so.

Cynics will say this is too good to be true. Academic Pratap Bhanu Mehta expresses surprise in an introductory chapter that inequality seems so low. Tribals account for 8% of the population and 5.2% of national income. This inequality is strikingly modest.

In the US, the bottom quintile (bottom 20%) of the population gets only 3% of the national income. In India, the bottom quintile gets twice as much. Tribals and dalits account for 24.8% of the population and as much as 17% of national income, clear evidence that some are well off.

One-third of tribals are in the lowest quintile, but as many as 4% of them are well off and in the top quintile. Differences between tribals are as great as all-India differences. Hence block benefits for all tribals (such as job reservation) are not warranted.

Tribal households in hill states average an annual income of Rs 72,052, well above the national average. In other states, tribal income rises in line with state incomes. Tribals average Rs 30,939 per year in low-income states, Rs 44,533 in middle-income states, and Rs 53,176 in high-income states.

Laws on reservation (and most analyses) make no distinction between tribals in different areas. That is a terrible mistake. Tribals in hill states are privileged, not deprived. The tribal north-eastern states have the benefit of low population, high literacy (boosted initially by Christian missionary schools), and extensive road networks built for defence purposes in these border areas. The north-east also benefits from huge infusions of Central money and substantial income from smuggling. Violent clashes are common in the north-east too, but these are not Maoist: they relate to secession (Nagaland) or inter-tribal tensions (Manipur and the Bodo territories).

Hill tribals constitute a creamy layer, absolutely non-comparable with illiterate tribals in the central Indian jungles. Missionaries worked in the central jungles too, but the number of tribals there was infinitely larger, so the impact on literacy was correspondingly small.

Tribals in low-income states like Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh earn slightly less than half the national average. This is a pity, but hardly represents a hopeless state of deprivation justifying violent insurrection. Like me, most readers will be astonished that tribals are not worse off in even the most inhospitable locations. Tribals in these locations can double their incomes by migrating to higher income states, and even more (to Rs 85,023 per year) by migrating to big cities.

Illiterate upper castes earn 1.4 times as much as illiterate tribals. This suggests a modest degree of discrimination. But a graduate tribal earns 3.7 times as much as an illiterate one. Among upper castes, graduates earn 4.2 times as much as illiterates. Clearly education provides a way forward for everybody.

This suggests the foundation of a proactive strategy to combat the socio-economic appeal of Maoism in tribal areas. First, roads and other infrastructure are needed to improve economic possibilities and migration opportunities. Second, education is needed to create skills and lift potential incomes.

The combined effect of infrastructure and education can lift tribals above the national average, as has been achieved in the hill states. The task will be much harder in the central Indian jungles. But it can be done. And it will benefit tribals far more than the supposed blessings of Maoist rule.

When the means don’t justify the end

2010-06-26T23:18:00.000-07:00

Vir Sanghvi

We live in violent times. Each day’s newspapers bring us news of more killings: encounters in Kashmir, honour murders in North India, terrorist groups who plant bombs in the name of Hinduism, violent Naxalite attacks and jehadi terrorism from across the border.

In recent times, Indians have done a fair amount of reflecting over the violence. The Maoists/Naxalites, in particular, have been the cause of extensive debate.

But the debate, seems to me, to flounder on a central misconception which, despite masses of evidence to the contrary, continues to reign within a section of the liberal intelligentsia.

This misconception is captured in three related statements. The first is: “For a man to give up everything and to turn to violence he must be really desperate and left with no alternative.” The second is: “If a man is willing to sacrifice his life, then it is clear that society has given him nothing to live for.” And the third is: “It is more important to understand the roots of the violence and to deal with those problems than to deal with the violence itself”.

This three-step construction is employed most often in discussions on the Maoist issue. “The fact that people have taken to violence in these areas even though they may be killed tells us that we have failed as a society. We must set that right, not go on and on about fighting the Maoists”.

You also hear this (though admitted far less often) in discussions of violence in Kashmir. “Why would the Kashmiris take to arms and risk their own lives unless India had left them with no option? We must look at their genuine problems.”

And of course, there is the global defence used for suicide bombers and jehadis. “The fact that a man is willing to use his body as a bomb tells how desperate Muslims are. The world (and the West in particular) has failed them.”

You will note that with each of these constructs, the credibility kept declining. We accepted this construction for Maoists, were troubled by it when it was applied to Kashmiris and were entirely unconvinced by it as an explanation for jehadi terrorism.

Now, let’s take this further. According to the CBI, Hindu extremist groups were responsible for the Ajmer blasts in October 2002, the Hyderabad blasts in May 2007 and the Malegaon blasts in September 2008. Perhaps the same terrorists were involved in the Samjhauta Express blast in February 2007.

The people the CBI regards as being behind the blasts have been arrested and now face trial. Many are clearly unrepentant. Why then, do we not say of them: “To resort to violence, Hindus must be treated really badly in India that they are willing to risk death in terrorist activities. We should improve the lot of Hindus in India”

Let’s take it even further. One notable characteristic of the maniacs who kill young people out of some sense of honour is that they show no remorse for what they have done. They are quite happy to face the legal consequences (which include the death penalty) because they believe that they have done the right thing.

But do we even say, “For people to turn to violence against members of their own family and risk death they must have been driven to desperation by the behaviour of their errant relatives and left with no choice. We should sort out their family problems before punishing them?”

The apologists for Naxalites and jehadis quickly abandon their special pleading when it comes to violent Hindu fundamentalists, let alone relatives who practise honour killings.

The different standards they apply to causes they approve of versus those they dislike, exposes the fundamental fallacy behind the people-only-resort-to-violence-when-they-are-desperate-and-have-no-choice argument.

Take the case of the Maoists. I don’t think any educated Indian disputes that the Indian State has failed to deliver either social justice or even an ounce of prosperity to the hapless tribals of Central and Eastern India. Contrary to the caricature painted by self-righteous professional activists, the average Indian does not treat the Maoist issue as a mere law and order problem.

But equally, who is to deny that there certainly is a law and order component to the problem? No State can afford to abdicate control over large swathes of its territory. And if a group declares war on the State then the State must fight back.

There is no contradiction between being sympathetic to the problems of the tribals and refusing to allow parts of India to slip into lawlessness.

Nor is it at all clear that people turn to violence only because they are desperate. Take the example of jehadis. Osama bin Laden is a millionaire who lived in luxury. The 9/11 bombers were middle class and well-educated. Even our home-grown terrorists tend to come from middle-class backgrounds. These are not children of deprivation, left with no choice but to turn to violence.

I get particularly annoyed when I hear some liberal activists arguing that 26/11 was a response to the problems faced by Muslims in Gujarat and Kashmir. The terrorists came across the border, they had no real experience of deprivation or suffering at the hands of the Indian State and acted only out of misplaced jehadi fervour. These were not desperate Indian Muslims striking out against the brutal Hindu majority — even the Pakistanis don’t claim that any longer.

Besides, if the jehadis are protesting Hindu domination, then why are there many more attacks in Pakistan, a Muslim-majority State? It is a matter of chance that Ajmal Kasab’s jehadi masters sent him to Bombay.

He could just as well have ended up in Karachi and caused havoc there.

It is significant that the they-are-desperate-and-have-no-choice argument is rarely trotted out to justify Hindu extremist violence.

Who oppresses Hindus in this country? Why should they be so desperate that they have to turn to violence?

The truth is that these are people who regard violence as an acceptable form of discourse. Such people include terrorists, Maoist revolutionaries, Hindu nutters, jehadi fundamentalists and maniacs with a twisted sense of family honour.

It is dangerous — and entirely wrong — to argue that such people are driven to violence because of desperation. The reality is that they actively chose violence.

Three factors lead to violence: strength of feeling, a belief that violence is not morally reprehensible and often, a sense that the violence will go unpunished. Each time we fail to recognise this and do not ensure that the perpetrators of violence are tracked down and punished, we strengthen their hands and give them more scope to kill policemen, blow up trains, attack temples and mosques and murder errant relatives.

So, of course we need to deliver social justice to tribals and we need to guarantee peaceful lives to the people of Kashmir. Nobody in his or her right mind disputes that.

But let’s stop romanticising Maoist killers. Let’s stop making excuses for terrorists. Let’s accept that when it comes to the crunch, a murderer is a murderer is a murderer.

(The views expressed by the author are personal)

21 dead, govt says drink rain water

2010-06-23T22:29:00.000-07:00

Raipur, June 24 : As many as 21 tribals have died of diarrhoea in Chhattisgarh’s Maoist-affected Bijapur district. And how has the district administration reacted? It has told the tribals to drink only rainwater!

Eight villages in the district, 400 km south of Raipur are affected by the infection, said R. Prasanna, the collector of Bijapur, while confirming the deaths.

He said the Maoist insurgency and poor road connectivity to the affected villages were coming in the way of delivering on-time health services to the people.

“We will ask tribal villagers to consume rain water and

they should chlorinate the drinking water sources as

safeguard. The diarrhoea deaths had resulted owing to drinking of contaminated water,” he added.

The government will dig tube wells in the village only after the monsoon season. Left unsaid was the sub-text: the villagers would have to wait for clean drinking water.

The Bijapur Chief Medical Officer (CMO), Dr Sujeet Biswas, told HT that so far, 155 serious cases of diarrhea have been reported in Bijapur this year.

“We act on delayed information and the situation gets worse by the time the medical team reaches the affected villages,” he said.

“There is very little safe drinking water in these villages as high summer temperatures this year have brought the water level down” said Chhattisgarh Health Secretary Vikas Sheel.

Redeem the promise

2010-06-16T21:49:00.001-07:00

The central challenge of Maoist insurgency is posed by the lack of political space for disgruntled tribals

Nitin Desai / New Delhi June 17

Two months ago, this column (“The Indians we forgot”, April 15) had dealt with the challenge of Maoist insurgency in Central India. In that context, it referred to the great tribal leader from the pre-Independence days, Jaipal Singh Munda. Today he is a forgotten man and several readers, intrigued by my reference, have inquired to find out more about him.

Jaipal Singh was a Munda from Chotanagpur. He was sent by missionaries to study at St John’s College in Oxford. He was an extraordinarily talented man who excelled at his studies, at sports, particularly hockey, and at debating. He was selected for the ICS but interrupted his training to captain the Indian hockey team that won the gold at the Amsterdam Olympics in 1928. Because of the interruption, he was asked to repeat a year of his training (babudom was the same even then!) which he refused to do.

Jaipal Singh became a voice for tribal rights in pre-Independence India and formed the Adivasi Mahasabha in 1938 which asked for a separate state of Jharkhand, to be carved out of Bihar. His finest hour came in the Constituent Assembly where he argued eloquently for affirmative action in favour of tribal India. The tone of his politics is captured well in the following quote from his speech on the Objectives Resolution in the Constituent Assembly on December 19, 1946:

“Sir, if there is any group of Indian people that has been shabbily treated, it is my people. They have been disgracefully treated, neglected for the last 6,000 years. The history of the Indus Valley civilisation, a child of which I am, shows quite clearly that it is the new-comers — most of you here are intruders as far as I am concerned — it is the new comers who have driven away my people from the Indus Valley to the jungle fastness... The whole history of my people is one of continuous exploitation and dispossession by the non-aboriginals of India punctuated by rebellions and disorder, and yet I take Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru at his word. I take you all at your word that now we are going to start a new chapter, a new chapter of Independent India where there is equality of opportunity, where no one would be neglected.”

The Maoist insurgency has arisen because we failed to keep our word. The central challenge of the insurgency is not law and order or development but the lack of political space for the young, disgruntled tribals who are taking to arms either out of conviction or peer pressure. And why would you expect them to do anything else but take to arms when confronted by the mafia of illegal mining and forest contractors, land-grabbers, corrupt officials and policemen and venal politicians?

A more effective law and order approach and a real effort at delivering development are certainly worthwhile. But that is not enough. The most important need now is to create a political environment that allows political expression for tribal concerns and gives tribal communities the power of self-government so that they can themselves fight these local mafias.

We also have to recognise the special constitutional position of the tribal areas that are a part of the Fifth Schedule which applies to nine states outside the North-East. In these states, the Constitution states that “the executive power of the Union shall extend to the giving of directions to the state as to the administration of the said areas”. Why does the central government not use this provision instead of moaning about how their hands are tied by state governments? Why are the governors failing in their constitutional responsibility to give an independent report on the administration of these scheduled areas?

We also need to look beyond the state level. Leaving aside the North-Eastern hill states, there is no state with a majority tribal population. Even the so-called tribal states, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh are only 26 per cent and 32 per cent tribal, respectively. So, at the state level, even if there are some tribal leaders, political (and economic) power rests in the hands of non-tribals.

We must begin at the geographical level at which effective control can be exercised by tribal groups. The Forest Rights Act is a useful first step. But more needs to be done to empower panchayati raj institutions and joint forest management committees in the Central Indian tribal belt. They should become the vehicles for delivering development rather than the discredited state machinery. These local institutions can be run by local tribal youngsters and leaders who can become the allies of development functionaries.

But development administration, however well-run, is not enough. We need a full-fledged political engagement of tribals. The history of dissent and how it has been accommodated shows that violence only stops when more constitutional means of political expression become accessible to the dissidents. This is how the Dravidian movement and insurgencies in the North-East were contained and provided with political space for the aspirants to power. In a different way, the same process was at work in accommodating the various caste-based groups that sought political power with the emergence of OBC- and Dalit-based political parties.

This has not happened with the tribal population. There is no tribal leader from Central India comparable in his or her national influence to Jayalalithaa or Karunanidhi or Mulayam Singh Yadav or Lalu Prasad or Mayawati. In the cacophony of voices that compete for attention on Raisina Hill, Race Course Road and Janpath, the tribal voice is altogether lost.

Given the numbers, the tribal voice will remain marginalised in national politics. Hence, we may do better to begin at the grass roots by creating a political process that inducts young political workers from schools and colleges into a structure that connects the national and local political process. This political outreach to engage tribal youth in local politics is far more important than more money for development or more forces for counter-insurgency operations. Rahul Gandhi is trying to do that in the Gangetic heartland with his reforms in the Youth Congress. He now needs to extend his remit to tribal India and provide young people there with a political option that is more promising than the Maoist gun. He must redeem the promise that his great grandfather implicitly made to Jaipal Singh Munda. Only then will this insurgency end.

Police atrocities on tribal people in Koraput Disrict

2010-06-15T23:18:00.002-07:00

K. Sudhakar Patnaik

The houses of the tribals were ransacked and many young men were picked up and assaulted brutally in CRPF camp at Malkangiri.

Operation ‘Green Hunt’ has been intensified by the Paramilitary forces, in Malkangiri district, Orissa. According to the official source of information the primitive KOYA tribe which populated the village of Pitakonda under Chintalwada Panchayat of Malkangiri district was rounded up by the central Para military forces on 11th June 2010 at about 4.30 am. The houses of the tribe were ransacked, money and and also picked up young men and assaulted them brutally in CRPF camp at Malkangiri. They made them unfit to even walk.

On 12th June, Sarapancha of Chintalwada, Haribandhu Hantal along with other villagers went to Malkangiri police station to ask about the people picked from the village. The police did not even spare the elected Sarpancha and put him in police lock up and later sent him to judicial custody on 14the June 2010. Later, four out of six of those who are under CRPF custody, have been released and the other two persons Irma Kawasi and Budra Padiami have also been sent to judicial custody, initiating number of criminal cases against them and treating them as Naxals.

The four released people told over phone to this correspondent that the police covered their faces with black cloth and tied their hands and they were not allowed to eat food. There is must be a probe on the brutality of the police. This incident itself proves that there is no law of the land prevailing in tribal populated villages in Koraput district in Orissa state.

Study reveals fall in tribal migration

2010-06-15T23:18:00.000-07:00

Chetan Chauhan

The number of tribals, especially from Naxal-affected states who are migrating either inside or outside the state, have reduced, indicates a government survey released on Tuesday.

National Sample Survey Organisation’s study on Migration in India also noted that the number of households from where migration takes place among tribals has also fallen — from about three per cent in 1993 to 2.2 per cent in 2008.

This has been due to the decline in migration from rural tribal areas, where majority of the tribals reside. However, their migration to in urban areas has almost doubled between 1993 and 2008.

The survey categorises as a migrant a person who has shifted from his or her place of residence during the survey period (July 2007 to June 2008).

The survey also reveals that the migration of tribals is very low from rural areas of Naxal-affected states such as Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa as compared to non-Naxal-affected tribal states.

The migration-prone households in Chhattisgarh are 1.9 per cent, in Jharkhand 0.8 percent and 1.3 per cent in Orissa.

In comparison, the number of such households in tribal-dominated states of Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Manipur was 4 per cent, 3.8 per cent and 2 per cent, respectively.

However, the survey does not give reasons for fall in migration in tribal areas especially. “It is for the researchers to find out,” said an NSSO official. “We have come up with out findings.”

Unlike tribals, the other social groups, Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Classes, have witnessed an increase in migration.

The survey says the number of households, where migration takes place, has increased by a percentage point, meaning more people coming to cities than before.

Assam's Kamprup District a heaven for Tiwa tribe

2010-06-14T09:47:00.001-07:00

Guwahati, June 14 (ANI): The Bherakuchi village in Assam's Central Kamprup District is a home to the Tiwa tribe and away from influence of modern cities.

Here there is no sound of honking vehicles or sprawling concrete buildings.

Green, earthy landscape with around 100 scattered bamboos and tin-roofed houses make up the village.

The land of the Tiwa or the Laloongs tribe, which means "enlightened people," the Bherakuchi village is like any other village, simple yet unique.

The Deori family, which depends on farming and makes rice beer to supplement its income.

Surendra Nath Deori and his brother Guren Deori are Tiwa folk artists, trying to preserve their art.

Surendra Nath has already composed 40 folk songs but due to financial constraints has not been able to record them.

Sarala Deori, his sister-in-law, has two children and is an anganwadi worker.

"We have an electricity problem and a drinking water problem especially during the summer season. We have a drinking water project that is funded by the Public Health Engineering. There is a well, but potable water is not available there," said Sarala Deori.

"Samadi", which is erected in the center of the village, is a big community house without any walls. Only males are eligible to become its member. Art and music training along with the socio-religious occasions of the village are held here.

The village also has a new library-cum-museum house, where traditional musical instruments and fishing equipment is displayed.

"If we talk about the Tiwa Culture, in 1972, I formed the first Tiwa Cultural Organization. But after 1982, we have been facing problems due to poor of finances. The organization helped Lansing Bordolio from our village to get the SILPI Pension," said Surendra Nath Deori.

The Tiwa tribe is included in the State Scheduled Tribe list. Recently, the Tiwa Autonomous Council was conducted for the development of the indigenous people.

The village has a traditional Council called "Khel" with different officials led by the headman, along with the head priest, 'Giyati', who conducts religious rituals.

"The Tiwa Council was formed in 1983. Though there have been many changes, still more needs to be done. The condition of roads is still pretty bad. We request the Government to look into the matter," said Surendr Nath Deori.

Besides farming, villagers rely on weaving and fishing to generate incomes.

Currently some industries are in the process of setting up Units in the area.

"We want industries in our village, so that there are more jobs. But the industries should not cause pollution like agri-based industries. We have great agricultural scope here. Such industries are welcome," said Ajit Deori.

The villagers are seeing visible signs of development and progress in their village and they are looking forward to a better future. By Peter Todd Alex

‘More than fatheads’: Africans object to portrayal in Indian ads

2010-06-13T23:34:00.000-07:00

Archna Shukla

A plane crashes in a desert. There appears a group of hungry tribal men, ostensibly Africans, who begin to rummage through the debris of the plane. A young boy among them sees something shining at a distance. He jumps in to claim the object. It turns out to be food wrapped in a silver foil. He takes a bite, but is distraught. He has burnt his mouth because the food is steaming hot. The film, a 10-second advertisement, ends with the message “Rakhe khana garma garam (keeps the food hot)”, along with the name of the manufacturer, SR Foils and Tissue Ltd.

“Hunger is a universal phenomenon. We all love food and we relish it the most when we are hungry,” says the spokesperson of the Delhi-based company, dismissing the observation that the use of African tribals to depict the “universal” phenomenon is, even if unwittingly, racist in nature.

Many Africans living in India, however, disagree. In a website thereigntimes.com, which gets a lot of traffic from people of African origin, they are expressing their anguish at recent examples of Indian advertisers using tribals, mostly and admittedly, Africans, to convey their messages.

“I and my friends have been outraged. It is sad to see us being portrayed as fatheads,” says Banji, a Ugandan studying in Bhopal, who runs the news and current affairs website.

In a recent article on the website, Banji said: “In the land of a billion and multiplicities of diversities, across almost all aspects, such as belief, food and more so people, one would think that such diversities should be matters of great pride, celebration, rather than ridicule.

Unfortunately that’s not the case in the Indian Subcontinent.”

Banji and his friends have been most enraged by ads from beverage makers Coca-Cola and Parle Agro for their brands Sprite and LMN, respectively. There are, however, more “offenders”, including telecom service provider Vodafone and engine oil and lubricants company Castrol.

The Coca-Cola ad shows two young men stumbling upon a group of African tribals in a jungle. (The ad makers admit that they shot in Africa.) While one of the men tries to please the tribals with some funny dance moves, the other one simply offers them Sprite and wins their heart. The Sprite campaign has a series of such ads, in one of which the “smart” guy flanked by two semi-clad “tribal” women asks his friend if he should let them loose on him.

The Parle Agro ad for its lemon drink LMN shows two thirsty African men digging through the sand and pulling out some watery roots to quench their thirst. Telecom operator Vodafone, which, in fact, has won praise for its Zoozoo campaign, recently aired two ads in the series arguably showing tribals in poor light. One of the ads, meant for conveying that subscribers can get their bills in local languages, shows an enraged “tribal” Zoozoo who is not able to decipher his bill being placated by a suave, suited Zoozoo.

“These ads are not only outrageous but also ridiculous. I have failed to know why such an MNC of that reputation as coca cola would choose such an AD,” says Mukasa, an African national, on thereigntimes.com.

The ad fraternity, however, sees the commercials as harmless and “humourous” creative efforts. “There is nothing racist. If at all, the protagonist in our ad is being respectful to the tribals and is treating them as equals which is why he offers them his favourite drink Sprite,” says Ajay Gehlaut, a creative director with Ogilvy & Mather, the agency that made the ad.

Rajiv Rao, national creative director with the same agency, which also executed the Zoozoo campaign, says: “We didn’t think of all these things. We wanted to convey our message in a humourous way... That’s all.”

Those at the receiving end, however, are not amused. “Things are as it is not too pleasant for us (the black people) here (in India). Such ads only leave a bad taste in mouth,” says Banji. He has asked makers of such ads to tender “an apology to all those who have been hurt” and “also desist from using such commercials in future”.

Improving tribal relations in NE India

2010-06-13T23:32:00.000-07:00

The Northeast India is a home of tribals with similar problems and aspirations. The socio-political and economic advancement is in a progressive stage of development.

As such, in course of their multifarious pursuit of interests, clashes come on the way hindering smooth relations among themselves.

In the past, various agitations and economic blockades by tribal groups in Assam to meet their demands had affected the states of Nagaland and Manipur. The basic disturbing aspects of our region require proper examinations in identifications of their basic root causes and find out better options in lieu of economic blockades or self-inflicting trouble in our regions.

It is an accepted fact that there is no better option for the Northeast people to live together in peace and harmony than anything else.

We all deserve good relations in the common interest of our people and in humanity. Accordingly, promotion of good neighborly relations should be the focus of our people.

However, there are some irritants which create problem to the Northeast people.

Firstly, as long as the Naga tribes are left attached to the state of Manipur, differences between the Meities and Nagas of Manipur are bound to exist on various counts including integration of the Naga people.

This issue will hang on till the final Naga political settlement with the government of India. Secondly, whether the Naga areas of Manipur are integrated with the state of Nagaland or not, the problem of colonial legacy of boundary demarcation inherited by the present Manipur government is likely to continue till the Nagas have their own separate administrative unit apart from the state of Manipur. This compromising solution if provided will generate better relations in the region.

As a matter of fact the government of India has the constitutional provisions to re-organize the state. It is true that the national leaders and political stalwarts like Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel were against states reorganization on communal lines.

However, situation has changed and the needs of the country are also required to change from time to time. Needless to say, two third members of the parliament can make suitable constitutional amendments as in where necessary. This infact requires the political will of the government of India.

The problems besetting the tribes of Assam specially the Karbi-Anglong and the Bodos are bound to be solved early. The political stand of ULFA may be worked out and settled amicably or such regional problems should remain pending for decades to come disturbing the people of the region.

In final analysis, the solution of the socio-political unrest in the North-east is with the government of India.

By Dr. Piketo Achumi, Asian College, Sovima.

Straight from cradle to grave

2010-06-09T22:06:00.001-07:00

Khandwa, MP, June 10 :Eight-month-old Tulsa died of malnutrition-related diseases in December last year, barely eight months after her brother’s death.

Tulsa’s brother, Shyam, a two-year-old boy, had died in April of diarrhoea and respiratory diseases caused by malnutrition.

District Collector Agarwal, however, denied this. “The deaths have nothing to do with food grain shortage. Tribals are ignorant about health issues,” he said.Tulsa and Shyam were two of the seven children who died last year in the tribal village of Mathnee, 120 km north-east of district headquarters Khandwa (the town and the district share the same name), about 275 km south-west of Bhopal.

Subsistence farming

Vishram and his wife, parents of the two children referred to above, are barely able to make ends meet. Their one-acre (43,560 sq. ft) farm gives them a quintal (100 kg) or two of food grain (wheat, soyabean and gram) a year. They don’t have any irrigation facility; thus, the family, like the rest of the village, has to depend on the rains for survival.

This gives them enough to barely eke out an existence for only 3-4 months a year. They somehow manage to survive the rest of the year.

Vishram and his wife, like other tribals in their 40-hut village, supplement their income by selling mahua (the juice of the mahua tree that is fermented to make a potent local liquor) they collect from the forests to local traders. This gives them Rs 1,000-2,000 per year, which sees them through another month and a half at most.

Lacunae in laws

They don’t have an antyodaya card. Hence, they cannot get the 35 kg of food grains a month – 33 kg wheat at Rs 2 per kg and 2 kg of rice at Rs 3 per kg – that the government provides for such cardholders.

Reason: they own agricultural land, making them ineligible for both below poverty line (BPL) and antyodaya cards. The above poverty line (APL) card the family has offers just 5 kg of wheat per month at Rs 7.50 per kg.

Even the district administration admits that the BPL criterion needs to be redefined for tribals. “The specific problem of BPL/APL/antyodaya cards, particularly in respect of tribals, needs to be looked into,” Khandwa District Collector DD Agarwal said.

Shoddy implementation

In this neck of the woods, the government’s welfare schemes exist mostly on paper only.

Some tribals do have job cards under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGA) but they were offered work for only 30 to 40 days a year last year compared to the statutory stipulation of 100 days.

This obviously does not supplement their incomes sufficiently to beat hunger.

Then, the local anganwadi centre (mother- and child-care centre) at the village is a sham. The anganwadi assistant there, who draws a government stipend, doesn’t even know the number of children with the centre.

Malnutrition central

The tribal block Khalwa, east of Khandwa town, is known for high levels of malnutrition. As many as 1,018 children were admitted to the five nutrition rehabilitation centres (NRC) in the district from April 2009 to March 2010 – ie, almost three children every day.

NGO Spandan Samaj Seva Samiti’s Seema Prakash and Prakash Michael alleged that there was huge underreporting of such cases.

"We call the rainy season the death season – most tribal villages are inaccessible; there is not much food grain left with them and there is no work offered under the MNREGA," they added.

"Anaemia is a major problem in this area. From my experience, I can say that about 70 per cent of tribal women and children in this area are anaemic. And malnutrition is the main cause of anaemia here,” said Dr Hitesh Bajpai, director, Shivam Hospital, which treats many such cases every year.

District Collector Agarwal, however, denied this. “The deaths have nothing to do with food grain shortage. Tribals are ignorant about health issues,” he said.

But before that, the authorities will have to ensure a more caring administration.

(Tracking Hunger is an HT initiative to investigate and report the struggle to rid India of hunger.)

Restoring traditional farming methods to meet food security

2010-06-07T22:02:00.001-07:00

Maharashtra's Korku tribe stores grain with dried neem leaves, while the Konda Savara tribe of Andhra Pradesh has an irrigation system where water is diverted through pipes made of banana trunks. These are some examples of local wisdom sustaining agriculture, which will now be backed by a specialised UN agency.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is a specialised agency working to improve agriculture, forestry and fisheries practices and ensure good nutrition and food security for all.

'We need to preserve traditional agricultural practices if we want to ensure food security,' says FAO land and water division director Parviz Koohafkan.

The Rome-based director was in Delhi last week to attend a workshop on tribal heritage agricultural techniques.

'Agriculture heritage is similar to the world heritage sites of Unesco. Twelve countries have already joined and now India is also joining,' Koohafkan told IANS.

Koohafkan is the coordinator for Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS), which identify traditional agricultural systems as heritage and preserves them.

India last week joined the GIAHS aiming to identify and preserve its traditional agriculture forms.

Globally, several systems of traditional agriculture have been given special status by the FAO identifying them as 'heritage systems'.

In the Andean ranges of Peru, potato is cultivated at an altitude of over 2,000 metres without a greenhouse. Rows of water canals run along intermediate rows of potato plantation absorbing heat during the day and keeping the crop warm during the night.

Similarly in China, the traditional practice of cultivating fish in rice fields was coming to an end due to increased use of fertiliser when a GIAHS initiative restored it.

'These are regions of outstanding biodiversity that reflect the natural evolution of farming and may help provide natural solutions to climate change in the future,' Koohafkan said.

India, which attained self-sufficiency in food production after the green revolution in the 1960s, has already taken steps towards framing a bill for ensuring food security.

However, Koohafkan feels that this is not possible without preserving the traditional forms of cultivation.

'Green revolution has been successful in India, but the environmental degradation cannot be ignored. The crops need more fertiliser and water. The green revolution has survived mainly on subsidies. It has also added to the social problems, we have invested in good land and ignored the poor land,' he said, adding that carrying both together is the need of the hour.

Orissa's Koraput region, India's first candidate for GIAHS status, has been nominated for the variety of rice, millet, pulses, and medicinal plants developed using traditional cultivation practices by tribal groups.

The Kuttanad region of Kerala, where cultivation is done below sea level has also been proposed for the status.

India is now planning to formulate a strategy for preserving its traditional agriculture forms.

'This is the first step, we still have to make the road map,' G.B. Mukherjee, secretary in the ministry of tribal affairs, told IANS.

'These systems have sustained agriculture through centuries and they are likely to survive in the next century also. We need to tell the tribals you have something special,' Mukherjee added.

(Anjali Ojha can be contacted at anjali.o@ians.in)

Delhi targets rebels with a cause

2010-06-07T21:56:00.001-07:00

By Sudha Ramachandran

BANGALORE - The Indian government has hit back at civil society groups who claim its "war against Maoists" is targeted at tribals living in the conflict zone rather than the rebels, accusing them of being rebel sympathizers.

The Home Ministry last month warned "civil society groups, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), intellectuals and the general public" that "supporting the CPI [Communist Party of India - Maoist] ideology" would attract action under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) of 1967.

Section 39 of the act states that "any person who commits the offense of supporting a terrorist organization with inter alia

intention to further the activities of such groups would be liable to be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding 10 years or with fine or with both".

The Maoists were declared a terrorist organization under the UAPA in June last year. Operations against them have been ongoing for several years but in November last year the government launched a coordinated military offensive called "Operation Green Hunt".

The operation, which is focused on five states in central and eastern India - Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and West Bengal - aims ostensibly to eliminate the rebel group, which the government claims want to overthrow the Indian state.

Violence between security forces and the Maoists have since reached unprecedented levels. In April, a Maoist attack on security forces in Dantewada claimed the lives of 76 troops, while a roadside bomb destroyed a loaded bus there in May, killing at least 40. The deadly derailment of a passenger train in West Bengal on May 28 killed some 140 people, but the rebels have denied involvement.

Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram has come under criticism from civil society activists for Green Hunt's objectives and strategy. For example, Supreme Court advocate and activist Prashant Bhushan says it seems the operation is aimed not at weakening the Maoists, but at driving out tribals from their homes so mining firms can exploit natural resources on their lands.

"Green Hunt is creating a civil war situation in mineral-rich areas, where tribals live. It plans to drive them out of here so that mining corporations can enter and begin extracting minerals that the military offensive is aimed," he told Asia Times Online.

Such criticism has raised the hackles of Chidambaram, mining corporations and proponents of the military offensive. Bhushan says anyone who criticizes the government's approach towards tribals or calls for an end to Green Hunt has now been deemed a "Maoist sympathizer".

Bhushan is one such activist, Others who share the tag include Booker Prize winner and human-rights activist, Arundhati Roy and Kavita Srivastava, general secretary of the People's Union for Civil Liberties.

The historian Ramachandra Guha, Delhi University professor Nandini Sundar and retired bureaucrat E A S Sarma, who petitioned the Supreme Court challenging the Salwa Judum - a government-sponsored vigilante group that fights Maoists in Dantewada in Chhattisgarh - have also been named alongside a host of other civil society activists.

The government appears to equating those who are open Maoist supporters with those it labels as sympathizers.

"The government is adopting the [former US president] George W Bush approach," says Sharanya Nayak, an activist who works on rights issues with tribals in Dantewada and Koraput in Orissa. "It's 'if you are not for us, you are against us' again," she said.

Nayak claims the government's definition of a rebel sympathizer is so "open-ended", that "anyone working for tribal rights will get branded as pro-Maoist". She said this was the case with Binayak Sen, a doctor who was working among tribals in Chhattisgarh and is a well-known human-rights activist. Sen was arrested in 2007 under the UAPA and the even more draconian Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act (CSPSA) before being released last year on bail.

Himanshu Kumar, a "Gandhian" who runs the legal-aid NGO Vanavasi Chetna Ashram in Dantewada, has also been repeatedly targeted by the police. His office was burned down last year. Hundreds of tribal activists, including minors, have been jailed for allegedly waging war against the state in Maoist areas.

The Home Ministry has named 57 organizations it says are working "for the cause of the Maoists". "The outfit [CPI-Maoist] has 57 front bodies working among the peasants, laborers, women, students, tribals, backward castes, etc, which supplement the activities of the armed cadres and mobilize the masses ostensibly for the cause of the people, but primarily for the cause of the party."

While some of the organizations may have links with the rebels, most are the NGOs operating not underground but in the public domain. Many are working to improve the rights of India's most marginalized groups.

Among those on the Home Ministry's watch list are the PUCL and the People's Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR), which have functioned as human-rights watchdogs for decades. The PUCL and PUDR have both been sharply critical of Maoist attacks on civilians. Other organizations like the Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha (CMM) have fielded candidates in state elections.

Thirty of these 57 organizations have been put on a watch-list of higher alert. These include the Bandi Mukti Morcha, a human-rights organization in West Bengal which is led by noted litterateur and social activist Mahasweta Devi. The Bandi Mukti Morcha has been vociferous in its criticism of the West Bengal government, which has been accused of grabbing land from rural poor to sell to private firms.

The Eighty-five-year-old Mahasweta Devi, a recipient of several of India's highest civilian and literary awards and the Magsaysay prize - Asia's equivalent of the Nobel Prize - has challenged the home minister to arrest her. "But he has to prove my Maoist connections first," she says.

Roy, whose essay "Walking with Comrades" led the Chhattisgarh government to contemplate legal action against her under the CSPSA, has now dared the government to arrest her. "I am on the side of the Maoists," she has said, adding: "I do not care ... pick me up, put me in jail."

Chidambaram and the mainstream media have accused the "sympathizers" of being pro-Maoist and pro-violence. But this ignores that organizations like PUCL and PUDR have criticized the Maoists for their recent deadly wave of attacks.

Political observers say the government's attempt to silence civil society activists is an error since these people - unlike most politicians or bureaucrats - have travelled in the conflict zones and engaged with a cross-section of society. Civil society workers would know Green Hunt's flaws and impacts better than anyone else.

Retired director general of police, K S Subrahmanyam, has suggested that Chidambaram should start listening to civil society and human-rights groups instead of relying heavily on intelligence inputs from police. Subrahmanyam says the latter are focused on security and oblivious to the larger issues of structural imbalances, development issues and displacement that many believe underlie the Maoist problem.

Although the government is taking aim at what is calls "Maoist sympathizers", it seems that no activity has fueled the expansion of the Maoist's violent activities more than Operation Green Hunt and the mining operations in tribal areas. Both have fed tribal alienation and anger, likely pushing youth to join the the rebels.

Sudha Ramachandran is an independent journalist/researcher based in Bangalore.

28 Tribal passengers electrocuted in MP

2010-05-15T08:05:00.000-07:00

Jabalpur, May 15 , 2010 Twenty-eight people, including 10 children, were electrocuted when an iron cabinet tied atop the bus they were travelling in touched high voltage power lines in eastern Madhya Pradesh on Friday.

Four of the 55 tribals returning from a marriage ceremony in a village in Mandla district, 460 km from Bhopal, were admitted to a hospital with injuries but declared out of danger.

Mandla District Collector KK Khare, who reached the spot with a rescue team, said, "A criminal case has been registered against the bus owner, driver and conductor. The driver, who ran away with the conductor, was arrested later," he said. Khare also said he had ordered a magisterial enquiry into the incident.

Passengers told the police that the driver was aware of the height of the high-tension lines and the risk involved and should have been careful.

Moreover, they should have stayed back to help the passengers jump off the bus safely, a passenger said.

For Sumran (26), it was a narrow escape. "I was standing near the footboard when I felt a shock and jumped off immediately," he said. "I managed to get my wife and sister off but I couldn’t save my son as panic-stricken people crowded the door."

In tribal heartland, India fights Maoists with herbs, honey

2010-05-14T00:41:00.001-07:00

Dugli, May 14 : Natural cosmetics, lime grass insecticides, gooseberry candy, herbal medicines and honey are among new weapons deployed by India in its fight against Maoist insurgents.

They are produced by villagers in state cooperatives in Maoist-hit Chhattisgarh, providing income that the government hopes will help keep the workers out of the ranks of the rebels and their supporters.

India's war against Maoist insurgents cannot be won with guns alone, experts say -- economic development and solutions to the grievances of rebel sympathisers are needed.

Last month's massacre of 76 Indian policeman by the rebels touched off a national debate about the need for "hearts and minds" efforts in insurgency-hit areas to accompany a nationwide security offensive launched last year.

The Chhattisgarh cooperatives are part of an attempt by the state to regain influence in the 45,000 square kilometres (17,374 square miles) of forests at the heart of what is known as India's "Red Corridor", where the rebels hold sway.

"We will not join the Maoists because we have money in our pocket and food in our belly," 18-year-old Sharda Mandavi told AFP as she busily ground herbs.

Around her, men and women mostly aged 16-19, in aprons and face masks, worked eight-hour shifts in spartan tin-roofed enclosures set up by the state's forest department.

"These kids are so busy that they cannot even think of joining the insurgency," said forest warden U.S. Thakur in Jabarra, 165 kilometres (100 miles) from state capital Raipur.

In the villages in the area, home to the Gond, Muria, Maria or Halba tribes, Maoist recruiters are constantly on the look-out for jobless or disaffected potential cadres. Nocturnal visits are common, say locals.

One supervisor at the reprocessing centre in Dugli, who was abducted last month by the rebels but was freed when he refused to join the movement, said the project is helping to fill a void.

"We are doing what the police cannot do with guns and bullets," he said, asking not to be named for security reasons.

"These men and women are now fighting back with candies, herbs and honey and in the process we are also protecting our forests from the Naxals (Maoists)," he said.

Chhattisgarh's top forest conservator R.K. Sharma told AFP in Raipur that 8,500 such facilities were operating in troubled areas to try and "wean away young men and women into skilled jobs."

The projects under the Joint Forest Management (JFM) scheme have paid dividends of 584 million rupees (12.9 million dollars) between 2000 and 2008 to local villages, according to records and supervisors.

Villages earn up to 30 percent of the profits from the sale of the forest products in government shops and other retail chains nationwide. Money is also shared with settlements that do not have resources.

Experts warn, however, that isolated projects such as Chhattisgarh's JFM are not enough to fight the Maoists in states where they have entrenched support that feeds off resentment at state corruption and incompetence, as well as land disputes.

"Primary healthcare, education, agricultural reforms and tenancy laws need to be improved," said Maoist expert Mallika Joseph from the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, a New Delhi-based private think tank.

"It is a challenge but it is doable. The Maoists cannot achieve them," she added.

Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram is the architect behind a surge of 58,000 federal paramilitary forces into Maoist-affected states and he has faced criticism, even from within his own party, for the hardline approach.

He has stressed, however, that the government has a "two-pronged strategy" that includes development aid.

But as with many national policies in decentralised India, there is often a gap between initiatives decided at a federal level and implementation by states and local governments.

Nearly one-third of five billion rupees (112 million dollars) of devlopment aid earmarked in financial year 2008-2009 for the 35 worst-hit Maoist districts had not been used, he told a ministry committee on May 3.

"There are also questions on whether the money spent actually had reached the intended beneficiaries," he said.

Besides these targeted funds, India has set aside 661 billion rupees in the current financial year for general rural development.

In addition to the implementation constraints of development projects, the government also faces a dynamic enemy.

"Naxals still come to us and say 'we will pay you more if you join our fight,'" said a 21-year-old man at the Dugli facility.

"But please do not mention our names as we are scared and besides the police are powerless to give us any protection."

Bridge tribals' trust deficit in Naxal areas: PC

2010-05-12T22:01:00.001-07:00

New Delhi, May 13 : Home Minister P Chidambaram on Wednesday asked India Inc to bridge the yawning "trust deficit" between industry and the tribals who have been opposing development projects despite the benefits these bring.

"Why is there such distrust between people and those who want to bring development?" Chidambaram asked.

Tribals form a significant portion of India's 33 most Naxal-affected areas, some of the most backward districts that are also the richest in terms of mineral wealth and natural resources.

But Maoists and many tribals stand in the way of new projects for mines or power plants — or create problems in existing projects — on grounds that the projects robbed the region of its natural wealth.

Chidambaram has paramilitary forces fighting Naxals under his charge and has been accused of ignoring the lack of develop-ment in these backward regions.

Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh – who had criticised him for stressing far too much on police action – told CNN-IBN's Devil's Advocate on Wednesday that the Maoists were "misguided ideologues" but could not be equated with cross-border terrorists.

At the annual function of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on Wednesday, the home minister spoke against use of excessive force to resolve the problem.

Instead, Chidambaram held out a mirror to India Inc that he said didn't seem concerned enough.

"It is a wake up call for us. We must ask why there is a trust deficit among the people of India, government of India, government of states," the home minister said.

"Why is there so much distrust of people who want to bring development and industry?" he asked.

Chidambaram also asked civil society — the section that did not believe that governments were bad, ugly and the enemy — should raise their voice rather than become the "silent lamb".

"This section, to put it charitably, is quiet, to put it uncharitably, totally unconcerned," he said.

Chidambaram made it clear that the government had the capacity to hit out at naxals but wanted calibrated, controlled police action to reassert the writ of the state and bring development to these areas.

India's neglected tribes gain voice in mobile news service

2010-05-11T01:29:00.000-07:00

By Nita Bhalla

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A new initiative promoting citizen journalism through mobile phones in central India's remote forests is giving a voice to poor and marginalised tribes, whose plight has long been overlooked by the state and media.

Trapped between Maoist insurgents and security forces for decades, tribal communities living in the mineral-rich, yet impoverished state of Chhattisgarh, have eked out a meagre living from the forests - farming, collecting firewood and wild fruits.
Due to low literacy levels, lack of infrastructure and poverty, they have lived a relatively isolated life - unable to read newspapers or afford a television set, let alone have access to a power supply to run such devices.
As a result, the communities - made up mainly of the Gond and Oraon tribes who comprise about a third of the state's 21 million people - have had little voice to publicly express issues that concern them as most can only communicate in their own tribal dialect.
But now, CGNet Swara or Chhattisgarh Net Voice - a platform where villagers can call a local number (08066932500) to hear local news affecting them and also record their own news - is spreading through remote villages buried in the dense forests.
"Tribals have been disconnected from the rest of India and even amongst themselves for years, but mobile penetration has now increased and I realised this was the only way to get their news to them," said Shubranshu Choudhary, a former BBC journalist, who began the service.
"People just have to call up and they can hear news in four different languages - Gondi, Kurruk, Chhattisgarhi and Hindi. It's helped to bridge the information gap for tribals who are on the other side of the digital divide."
MAKING A DIFFERENCE
Choudhary, who started the initiative in February, has gained support from Microsoft, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and, most recently, the International Centre for Journalism.
CGNet Swara currently receives around 50 calls a day - with some callers just wanting to listen to the latest news, while others record messages.
Reports are vast and varied: teachers not being paid at local schools, police brutality against tribals, protests by villagers displaced by the insurgency, arsenic poisoning in village water sources.
There are also poems and tribal songs, appeals by local NGOs for funds, and even information on the All India tribal football tournament.
All messages are verified by Choudhary and his team of volunteers who confirms the reports with tribal communities on the ground, before translating the messages and posting them on the system.
The recorded messages are also sent by email to a group of 1,700 people - including activists, environmentalists, police officers and journalists - who are provided with the names and numbers of responsible officials and are invited to lobby them.
For example, a man called Kushal from Bijapur district reported that the head of the district had ordered the removal of a liquor shop in front of a school after hearing concerns about it on CGNet Swara.
In another case, a school worker called Mangal Kunjam in Dantewada district reported that school workers at an ashram had not been paid for more than a year. A week later, after the concerned official was flooded with calls, all the school workers were paid.
CGNet Swara also hopes to start broadcasting weather reports for farmers, public health messages on hygiene and sanitation as well as on malaria prevention.
The service is also open to aid agencies, which can send out information such as when they are running an eye camp or mobile hospital in a certain village.
LIMITED COMMUNICATIONS
According to a Delhi-based media research agency, Charkha, only 2 percent of space in Chhattisgarh's mainstream media is dedicated to covering the livelihood issues of indigenous people. India's tribals number some 80 million people, and most of them live below the poverty line.
Newspapers and radio stations in the tribal belt of the country - Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa - do not publish or broadcast in tribal languages.
Private radio stations are not permitted to broadcast news and are resigned to chat, music and phone-ins. The only radio station which can broadcast news is the state-run All India Radio - seen by many as being pro-government.
Televisions and internet services do not exist and activists say even if they did, more than 50 percent of rural households in Chhattisgarh do not have electricity.
But mobile phone usage is gaining ground amongst India's indigenous people.
"There is at least one mobile in every village," said Choudhary, "so I thought there must be a way to take advantage of this to get news to the people."
With help from the Microsoft Research Laboratory in Bangalore and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the service is now spreading.
Recent funding from the International Centre for Journalism will soon be used to make calls toll free (they currently cost one rupee per minute) and UNICEF has provided funds to train tribals in citizen journalism.
Aid workers say the service is already showing results and helps bring accountability in public service delivery.
"We think this is a fantastic medium to give a voice to people in these remote areas," said Shaheen Nilofar, head of UNICEF's office in Chhattisgarh's capital, Raipur.
"It flags up social sector issues in areas where information is hard to come by and gives a space to social sector issues affecting tribal communities which the mainstream media do not address."

Peace march begins in Chhattisgarh

2010-05-06T07:31:00.000-07:00

Raipur, May 6 (IANS) A peace march led by Gandhian Narayan Desai and others left Raipur Thursday for Chhattisgarh’s Maoist bastion of Bastar to hold talks with the tribal people.
The marchers will also cover Dantewada, the site of the April 6 rebel massacre of 76 security personnel, the worst such killing since the Maoist insurgency began in the country over four decades ago.
The marchers, including academician Yash Pal, will reach Bastar, a sprawling and heavily forested region around 300 km from here. On Friday, they will be at Dantewada and talk to local people.
The members held a public meeting here Wednesday and expressed concern over the rising poverty among Bastar’s tribal people. They urged both the police and Maoists to work for a ceasefire.
Social activist Swami Agnivesh was a part of the group, which says that the tribals have hardly benefited from development schemes since India’s independence in 1947.
The Wednesday meeting was marred by protests by a few cadres of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who called the organisers Maoist sympathisers. Congress activists raised slogans like “Outsiders go back”.
The outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) commands hundreds of armed guerrillas, young women included, in Bastar’s interiors. Most of Bastar’s people are tribals.

Human Rights, Naxalites and Tribals in India

2010-04-27T04:09:00.000-07:00

By Prem Kumar Tirumani

The Naxalite attack on security forces in Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh on April 6 in which 75 CRPF men were killed was more shocking to the nation than the terrorist attack at Taj Hotel in Mumbai. Attack from outsiders is not new to India. The attack of the Muslim extremists may be categorised as a contemporary version of the ancient Mughals. However, armed Indian citizens killing their own Indian security personnel in large scale was rarely heard since the post Independence communal riots.

Though the left wing extremists defend the act by saying that its a citizens fight against the corrupt government, there is no rational justification in their argument. Its a direct violation of human rights. Its a murder of innocent lives. The corrupt officials, that they are actually after, stay untouched in their seats. Its high time for India to re-evaluate its policies on development and internal security.

India has been proud that its economy was least effected by the recent global economic crisis and it is one of fastest growing economy in the world. However, if we visit the tribal areas, we could rarely realise the fruits of this growing economy. There are villages that don't have even the basic necessities such as safe drinking water, primary education and health services. The radiance of 'shining India' never reached them and if some NGO sends a beacon of hope, it is instantly curbed with brutal force by religious extremists.

It has been that in these underdeveloped areas, mainly inhabited by poor tribals, the Naxalism has flourished. Most of them are raised with their rights violated every day. Not just human rights even the fundamental rights ensured by the constitution. Inequality, caste discrimination, conversion issues, re-conversion issues, poverty, physical, sexual and emotional abuse has been part of their daily life. For the people here, the definition of democratic government is not the "government of the people, by the people, for the people.". For them government means, "patwari (revenue officials), police and forest guards." And all of them are only the agents of exploitation.

In order to make the locals understand that governance means doing good to them and not troubling and exploiting them, the government has to reform its policies and change its strategies to bring development in these downtrodden areas. IAS officers and civil servants have to debate over the ways and means that are being adopted by the government to tackle Naxalism.

(c) Prem Tirumani, 2010. All rights reserved. This article or any part of it cannot be copied or published in any form without the acknowledgement of the author.For more details contact prem.tirumani@gmail.com or visit www.premtirumani.com

Adivasi Girls forced into prostitution

2010-04-27T00:44:00.000-07:00

Uncertainty and fear grip Bokajan residents for the last few days following the incident, where four teenaged girls were rescued in New Delhi by local police with the help of Delhi police along with some NGOs, sources said Monday. According to one prominent Bokajan resident, parents of young girls are spending sleepless nights as insecurity and degrading social system are worrying them every moment.

The four girls from Adivasi community were taken to Delhi by certain notorious person, promising them of lucrative jobs and on reaching Delhi they were forced to flesh trade against their will. The girls were later handed over to the Assam police after they were rescued by Delhi police and some NGO's.

One Durga Derai of Naokata vilalge, Bokajan made a formal case against one Gopal Munda of the same village on April 14, charging him of enticing the four girls to leave their native place on the evening of April 6. After which a case against Gopal Munda was registered under section 53/10 U/S 365, IPC, Bokajan Police after some initial search operations went to Delhi to rescue the four naïve girls from the clutch of Gopal Munda. After hectic maneuver, Bokajan police led by its OC, Promod Kr. Das managed to locate Gopal Munda on April 17.

Assam Police with the help of Delhi police along with some NGO's rescued the four girls from different locations of Delhi like Sukurpur, Greater Kailash, Kutub Minar Chowk and Gurgaon.

According to the report, the girls were given jobs in a lesser known organization (Gita placement) to shield their actual identity and their nature of work.

It might be mentioned that in the past, members of different NGOs and Police officials have rescued many such unfortunate women.

Economic hardship is one of the prime causes that often force such unfortunate young girls to take up such profession.

via

Adivasi.ozg.in

TB haunts impoverished tribal settlements

2010-04-27T00:40:00.001-07:00

Muralidhara Khajane

ITDP a non-starter in starter in Hunsur taluk

Stricken:Members of the tribal community in Bettada haadi, Hunsur taluk, also grapple with malnourishment and anaemia. MYSORE: Despite numerous special schemes and financial allocations, tribal communities in Hunsur taluk lead a life of poverty, marked by severe malnutrition.
In Bettada haadi in the taluk, tribal residents grapple with appalling health conditions. Eight people in 28 families have tuberculosis, five have died in the past six years, and many others are malnourished and anaemic. They live in dilapidated houses that lack sanitation. Defunct borewells, broken pipes and non-functional streetlights are common sights.
Despite substantial allocations by the Centre under the Integrated Tribal Development Project (ITDP), nothing has changed here.
Community head Sannaiah (60) said, “In our haadi, the anganwadi doors have not opened for a while, 20 families are landless, and 10 do not have below the poverty line (BPL) cards. Only a few of us have received job cards under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and even the few do not have jobs.”
Hunsur Taluk Panchayat executive officer Basavaraj admitted that there are eight tuberculosis cases in the settlement, of which the condition of three women is precarious. “They will be shifted to the district hospital” he told The Hindu, blaming the “apathy of the authorities in implementing the ITDP effectively”.
Development Through Education director Srikant said, “Over 40 per cent of Primitive Tribal Groups (PTGs) are haunted by malnutrition and tuberculosis in every settlement. Attendance in ashram schools dips by the day as healthy tribal children fear contracting tuberculosis.”
‘Cornering benefits'
He also alleged that a community that calls itself Naikas had cornered the ITDP benefits, while impoverishing the others.
The situation is no different in 218 forest-based haadis in Mysore district, where the Union Government has identified over 22,000 people as belonging to PTGs, according to Mr. Srikanth. He attributes the current state of the ITDP to the closure of the Special Offices that had been constituted to oversee the implementation of the programme.
He expressed concern that the applications submitted by the PTGs to the district committee under the Scheduled Tribes and other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forests Rights) Act had not been disposed of so far. Through a letter to Deputy Commissioner P. Manivannan, who is also the chairman of the district committee, Mr. Srikanth urged him to dispose of the applications and distribute title deeds to PTGs.
Mr. Srikanth stressed the need to confiscate tobacco and ginger crop grown on the land leased by tribal people to local farmers and support the tribal people in cultivating their land. He also urged that ITDP Special Offices under be opened to facilitate the implementation of schemes under the programme.

Start talks, stop Operation Green Hunt: Arundhati Roy

2010-04-26T03:40:00.001-07:00

NEW DELHI, April 26 : In a public meeting organised by the Forum Against War on People at the Gandhi Peace Foundation on 24th April 2010, various organisations and individuals unequivocally demanded an immediate and unconditional stop to Operation Green Hunt and the plunder of people’s resources.

Prof. Randhir Singh, prominent political thinker and former Head of the Department of Political Science in University of Delhi, noted that “the present government has armed itself with all kinds of armed forces in its war against people. In many parts of the country the behaviour of the Indian state can only be described as a terrorist state.

Much has been made of the recent killing of 76 CRPF personnel in Dantewada. But what were they doing in that place? Is it not to repress the people and take away their land and resources to make way for the big corporations? People’s democratic verdict has been repeatedly flouted by the ruling classes.

So the people need extra-parliamentary sanctions to pursue the democratic aspirations of the people. Without extra-parliamentary sanction to defend, the people will not be able to fight for democracy.

What is happening in this country is part of a much larger story unfolding. Whether it is Congress or BJP, they are part of furthering the neo-liberal capitalist path of development. In contrast, the people’s alternative path of development has to be pursued and struggled for.”

Badshah Mandi from Jangalmahal (Lalgarh) in his speech stated that “Police is resorting to indiscriminate firing, torture, imprisonment and killing of the people of Lalgarh. Rape and torture is being used, people’s health centers built by the PCPA have been occupied by the paramilitary forces, the medicines have been taken away. Lalgarh has created an alternative to the governments run by the CPM, UPA or NDA, since the development policy of these governments is nothing but the policy of genocide. The sufferings of the adivasi people are the result of these government’s policies. The people of this country are suffering from state violence for more than last 60 years. The question of violence should not be reduced to armed struggle alone; the question is much deeper. The struggle is not between the Maoists and the paramilitary forces, but between the people and the Indian govt., between the ‘development’ polices of the government and people’s alternative development.” Aparna of the CPIML (New Democracy), gave more instances of atrocities on the people’s struggles all over the country in the name of fighting Naxalism/Maoism. People fighting for even their constitutionally mandated rights in Kosambi and Ghoorpur in Uttar Pradesh, Kalinganagar, Narayanpatna, Jagat Singhpur and Niyamgiri in Orissa are facing the brunt of this war on people. When people raise their voices against government’s pro-corporate policies, the government led by the Union Home Minister P Chidambaram sends armed forces to crush them.

The meeting also raised its opposition to the wars waged by the Indian state on the people of Kashmir and the North East. Malem of Committee for the Protection of Democracy, Manipur (CPDM) said, “We have been raising our voice against the Indian state’s war on people for a long time. The people’s struggle for freedom in Kashmir, Manipur, Nagalim, Asom and other places against the state is going on for many decades.

The military offensive waged by the Indian state must be immediately stopped.” Prof. Jagmohan the nephew of Shaheed Bhagat Singh pointed out that this war of the people against the anti-people policies against the anti-people character of the Indian government has reached Delhi through Kashmir, North East and the rest of the country as people have risen in revolt.

The disparities between the rich and the poor have become so intense and sharp that the genuine anger of the people cannot be held back for long.

Varvara Rao, the revolutionary poet reminded the audience of the violation of its constitutional obligations by the government. He said that the Naxalites have always showed keenness from 1987 till today to sit for talks with the government to address people’s basic issues like land, irrigation, education and health. But the government’s policies have failed to address the problems faced by the oppressed sections of the society. In comparison, the Naxalites/Maoists have established a pro-people alternative model of development.

Arundhati Roy asked, is the government ready for talks? The government is claiming that it is ready for talks, only the Naxalites are not interested. However the reality is that the government badly needs war, not peace.

The money generated by the mining industry can buy off the government, the political parties, thejudiciary, everything. This war is waged by Mr. Chidambaram on behalf of them. Who are the Maoists? They are the malnourished, hungry and poverty-stricken adivasis going through an acute struggle for survival. The government is using two guns to repress the people: ‘development’ and the media. The government is confident that similar to Telangana, Mizoram, Nagaland, Manipur or Kashmir, it will be able to crush the ongoing movements of the adivasis as well.

Calling for talks between Maoists and the government, writer Arundhati Roy on Saturday demanded an immediate ceasefire on both sides, formal halting of the combing operations and Operation Green Hunt, and resettling people who were rendered homeless in Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district.

Ms. Roy also demanded that details of memoranda of undertaking signed between the government and mining industries, involving tribal regions, be made public.

She was speaking at a public meeting here on ‘Indian state’s War on People and the Assault on Democratic Voices’.

It was organised by the Forum Against War on People, a forum of civil society organisations, parties, individuals and social activists.

While the death of CRPF personnel at the hands of the Maoists was saddening, one could not dismiss the alleged atrocities committed by the security personnel against tribals, Ms. Roy said.

Ms. Roy alleged that the government was not interested in talks as it claimed.

Randhir Singh, head of the Political Science department in Delhi University, said: “The political parties in India seem to have decided that neo-liberal capitalism is the way to proceed. The kind of development the government is practising in tribal areas can be labelled ‘developmental terrorism’.”

The challenge for the Maoists was to provide a viable alternative mode of development as opposed to the modes proposed by the ruling classes, he said.

Giving an account of the situation in West Bengal’s Lalgarh, activists claimed that owing to the presence of the joint security forces, people could not venture out to earn their livelihoods. They were routinely tortured on suspicion of being Maoists, and their women were harassed.
‘Great deal of trouble’

“Operation Green Hunt is causing a great deal of trouble. People are arrested without warrants, peaceful rallies are fired upon, women are insulted and basic health facilities are not available. The government does not allow anyone to enter this zone as it does not want its wrongdoings exposed,” said activist Badshah Mandi, who also claimed that developmental facilities built by the People’s Committee against Police Atrocities were routinely destroyed.

B.D. Sharma, former Commissioner of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Commission, said the basic conflict could be rooted in ownership of resources. “While the government behaves as if it owns the land, the tribals have traditional rights to the land.” According to the Supreme Court, the government did not have the right to hand over tribal land to others, he said.

Poet Varavara Rao said talks should take place between the government and the Maoists, in the same way the exercise was made possible between the Maoists and the Andhra Pradesh government with media and civil society efforts. However, “it is not possible for anyone to condone Maoist violence.”
Slams media

Speakers alleged that the media had not been accurate in reporting and presenting an analysis of the events related to the Maoists. Stress was laid on simultaneously calling a halt to “state atrocities on people” as well as Maoist violence.

Indian tribal girls not being used as guinea pigs for cancer vaccines

2010-04-24T04:49:00.001-07:00

Health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad put his foot down on the allegation that Indian girls are being used as guinea pigs for anti-cervical cancer vaccines. He denied this allegation of the opposition vehemently. The efforts were in a direction to equip India to deal with the deadly cervical cancer, Health ministry clarified. Surrounded by fierce criticism from all quarters, Health ministry has come out in strong defense of its moves. In a bid to try to control the situation, a committee has been set up for further investigation. The import and trials of vaccines Cervarix and Gardasil have been stopped now. .

Girls being used as Guinea pigs became a widespread topic in the opposition after six tribal girls who took the vaccine died. They were
administered the Cervarix and Gardasil vaccines as a part of the ongoing trials. Charges of violation of guidelines have also been leveled by the opposition. CPI-M leader Brinda Karat came out strongly against this issue. She questioned on the use tribal girls as subjects for trials and on the informed consent. Cervical cancer vaccines were administered to tribal girls as a part of the HPV (human papillomavirus) vaccine trials.

Ghulam Nabi Azad had drawn a lot of flak in this whole case. He was questioned by the opposition on various aspects mainly the reason for choosing only tribal girls for trials. There have been charges that multinational are using Indian grounds to test their vaccines. Also, the permission of the cervical cancer vaccine administration was given to a US-based NGO, PATH, which called for a conflict of interest. PATH apparently is the partner of the manufacturing company Merck in other projects. Merck is the importer of the cancer vaccines. Ghulam in response iterated that PATH was an NGO of international repute.

The newly formed committee will look in to the safety and ethical of these trials. It is also expected to probe regarding the role of senior officials in this case. S.P. Agarwal, former Director-General of Health Services; Sunita Mittal, head of the Department Obstetrics and Gynecology, AIIMS; and pharmacologist Ranjit Roy form the panel. The opposition however was not happy with the constitution of the committee as it believed that medical experts should form a part of the panel as well.

‘We Have Pushed Civilisation To A Tipping Point’

2010-04-23T11:35:00.001-07:00

There was a time when Bianca Jagger was known as rock star Mick Jagger’s wife. But for the last 30 years, the Nicaragua-born fashion icon has been a people’s rights advocate and a goodwill ambassador for the Council of Europe. Recently, on her way back from her travels among the Kondh tribals in Niyamgiri, Orissa, she spoke to SHOMA CHAUDHURY about how multinational mining giant Vedanta’s operations are threatening the tribals with extinction. Excerpts:

PHOTO: CLAUDIA JANKE / ACTIONAID

How did your trip to Niyamgiri and Vedanta’s mining project there come about?
I’ve been a human rights, social justice and environment protection advocate for the last 30 years. I am the founder and chair of the Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation. I also love India and have a long relationship with this country. Many people know this. This is why Action Aid approached me to meet Sitaram Kulisika, a tribal leader who was coming to London to testify at a Vedanta shareholders’ meeting. I was very moved by his compelling testimony, his commitment to his homeland and his people. “Once they start mining, the mountain will be bulldozed, the rivers will dry up and our livelihood will be lost,” he said. “We don’t know how to adapt and survive and our way of living is not available in the cities. We will be extinct.” I was so appalled to hear what Vedanta was doing in Orissa that I bought shares and attended the shareholders meeting. Vedanta screened a glowing film of all the wonderful things it was doing in India. But there were many organisations there, like Amnesty International and Action Aid, Survival International and Indian groups where Vedanta is operating, who asked very serious questions and presented evidence of the company’s atrocious human rights record. Vedanta’s founder-director Anil Agarwal had no answers for this so I began to write articles in The Guardian and campaign to urge investors to reconsider their involvement in Vedanta. The trip to Orissa was my next logical step.

‘Abuse of natural resources leads to revolt everywhere’

If you were to distill what is wrong with the project, what would you pick?
At the heart of what’s wrong is a very important question. Are we saying today, in the 21st century, that in the name of progress and development we are prepared to sacrifice the fundamental rights of tribals and indigenous communities? Are we going to endanger their survival, in order to enable corporations to exploit our natural resources? Haven’t we arrived at a point in time when corporations and states can voluntarily acknowledge they have a social and corporate responsibility to safeguard people’s livelihood? The Niyamgiri mountain is a very important rainforest. Not only do the Kondh tribals see it as sacred, they have managed to retain their tradition and lived a completely selfsufficient life in harmony with nature. The only thing they buy from the outside world is salt and petrol. One of the tribal elders told me, “Just as a fish cannot survive outside water, we cannot survive outside Niyamgiri.” When you get to this remote place and see these beautiful people, you really understand — how can we expect them to survive anywhere else?
Also, the Kondhs are not the only issue. The top of the mountain has a bauxite-rich plateau. Bauxite collects rainwater very efficiently. The water collected at the top of this mountain feeds two major rivers in India and approximately 34 streams. Vedanta’s project will not only endanger the lives of the Kondhs, it will affect water sources and impact other communities further down stream. So is the project worth it? The only reason they can get away with it is because they have co-opted the State. I have been told by a reliable source that the State owns 25 percent of Vedanta in India. Therefore, Orissa can no longer be an honest broker, make the company accountable and adhere to human rights and environmental laws. The State has become part of the company.
Do we need to rethink the very premise of development? Where does that leave us, who speak for the poor, but are beneficiaries of the progress we criticise, flying around, using ACs, driving big cars…
Throughout my life I often confronted governments in Central and South America about their irrational environmental policies, I was told again and again — Bianca, we need to do this for progress and development; we need to bring jobs to the people; pay our foreign debt, improve the lives of the poor and downtrodden. What I want to say to you is that neither did it improve the lives of indigenous people, farmers and the poor nor did it create jobs. It only left behind a trail of environmental destruction and abuse of our natural resources, helping MNCS to make huge profits. But it never benefited the people. It didn’t even raise the status of the countries in question — just made some people into multi-billionaires. So yes, we do need to think about a development that is sustainable, inclusive, and improves the lives of people, without destroying the environment.
Across the world, including India [see TEHELKA: ‘It’s Rape, Reap, and Run’, April 3, 2010], mining is dogged by corruption. We can legislate but people can be bought out. What’s the answer?
I believe that we have pushed our civilisation to a tipping point. If we are serious about reversing catastrophic climate change, we do need to lead very different lives. Of course everybody gets nervous when we talk about real changes in our lifestyles. But quite apart from this, there is something very important that governments need to think about.

‘There is collusion between the Orissa state and Vedanta’

I come from a country that has had many foreign occupations and a revolution. I’ve worked with people for many years in countries ravaged by war. And, everywhere, I have seen how the indiscriminate abuse and exploitation of natural resources at the expense of people’s livelihood breed insurrection. This is not new or indigenous to India — so the Indian government needs to seriously reflect upon this question. They need to understand that if you expel thousands of people from their ancestral lands and deny them their fundamental human rights, these people will be left without a means to survival, and as the Kondh said to me, they don’t just want to be compensated. Merely money cannot substitute for land, so it is a question of how to avoid war. You don’t avoid war by bombing people or calling in the army but by really getting at the root causes.
What was your experience in Latin America — of mining, State repression, revolution and it’s fallout.
Everything about it was archetypal. You had the great gap between the very wealthy and the very poor. You had governments that aligned themselves with multinationals that exploited the natural resources without ever benefiting the people they displaced. You had a trail of people who died of diseases in the mines of Nicaragua, other Latin American countries and throughout the developing world. And then you had insurrections everywhere. Guatemala, Salvador, Nicaragua and many other parts of Latin America. Unfortunately, many of the revolutions eventually betrayed the people too. So it is important for the government of India to look at such examples. and for the chief minister of Orissa and other states to think twice about what methods they want to use against the tribal people and farmers and the oppressed. Maybe it’s important for political leaders in Indian to read what Gandhi or Nehru said about tribals’ rights. You cannot push development down their throats.
What makes Vedanta symptomatic of mining and bigcorporate malpractices?
Vedanta is one of the worst companies I have come across but what’s most shocking is that it’s happening in the 21st century. This company is misleading the world with its incredible PR campaign. It is making people believe it wants to do good for the people, that it will build a university etc, but this is all fiction. Here’s just one example of the kind of things they have been doing. In Bandhaguda, a place very close to their [alumina] refinery, in 2002, the company told the village that they would build a factory, give employment to everyone, displacing only one village. They have already displaced four, and I have been told that they promised one lakh rupees to those who had land titles (as you know, very few have land deeds, especially tribals) and Rs 50,000 per acre to those who had no titles in exchange for their rights, and worse, Rs 1,000 to those willing to give up their houses. One thousand rupees! That’s just over $20! It’s shocking. And of course they haven’t given them jobs. I think there are some 57 foreigners who are running this refinery. So, in 2003, when the people in this village saw that the company had started cutting down the forests way beyond the declared area, and that all the promises made were false, they decided to demonstrate outside the construction site. About 400 people gathered — men, women and children. The police jailed all the men for seven days. When they were released, they were told they had become outcaste and needed to go to Puri to pray and redeem themselves at Lord Jagannath’s temple. The state police were used alongside Vedanta company goons to forcibly take them to Puri, while they built the refinery wall. In violation of customary law, their ancestral graveyard was destroyed and the area illegally enclosed in the Vedanta compound. This meant the people could no longer go to pray. This is a serious human rights violation, and it is extraordinary that all this was done in collusion with the police and the Orissa state. All the documents I have show the collusion between the state and Vedanta. When I arrived at the Biju Patnaik airport in Bhubaneswar, I was struck by a billboard that said “Mining happiness for the people of Orissa”. What a cruel irony. The aluminium refinery has brought nothing but misery, disease and impoverishment to the communities in the area, and if Vedanta’s bauxite project is allowed to go ahead, it will endanger the very survival of the Kondhs.
Did you speak to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik?
I tried but couldn’t. I hope he realises that respect for justice and humans is not just important for the tribals but for stopping the spread of insurrection in his state.
The trouble with Indian democracy is that it is now merely equated to elections.
This is not an Indian problem. This is a concept that America had brought in first. You have elections in Afghanistan even if everyone is busy killing each other — in the end they were not even democratic. You had polls in Iraq even if you didn’t have people participating, or in Latin America. One should understand, that you don’t have a democracy because you had an election. Building a democratic state requires a lot more than just an election.
So how do we push for more ethical corporate conduct?
I have been working with communities that include five indigenous tribes in Ecuador. As you might know, the oil giant Texaco (merged with Chevron and is now known as Chevron) was in Ecuador for 20 years and during that time they devastated large swathes of the rainforest and contaminated all the water sources. There was a law passed in Texas in 1919 that demands that oil companies line their pits so that the contamination does not seep into the water sources but they didn’t do it because that would have required them to spend a bit more. So for years people have been drinking, cooking, swimming and bathing in this contaminated water and are dying of cancer and leukaemia, the children suffer from skin diseases and women suffer from spontaneous abortions. In 1993, they organised themselves and filed a class action lawsuit against the company in the US. The trial is still going on, but today they have a chance of winning a 6 billion dollar case against the company. You would have never dreamed that a remote indigenous people would have been able to galvanise and organise themselves to take on a giant. But they did, and if they could win this case — which I hope they will — it will send a clear message that corporations can no longer act with impunity in the developing or emerging industrialised nations.

Human Rights, Naxalites and Tribals in India

2010-04-23T03:18:00.001-07:00

The Naxalite attack on security forces in Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh on April 6 in which 75 CRPF men were killed was more shocking to the nation than the terrorist attack at Taj Hotel in Mumbai. Attack from outsiders is not new to India. The attack of the Muslim extremists may be categorised as a contemporary version of the ancient Mughals. However, armed Indian citizens killing their own Indian security personnel in large scale was rarely heard since the post Independence communal riots.

Though the left wing extremists defend the act by saying that its a citizens fight against the corrupt government, there is no rational justification in their argument. Its a direct violation of human rights. Its a murder of innocent lives. The corrupt officials, that they are actually after, stay untouched in their seats. Its high time for India to re-evaluate its policies on development and internal security.

India has been proud that its economy was least effected by the recent global economic crisis and it is one of fastest growing economy in the world. However, if we visit the tribal areas, we could rarely realise the fruits of this growing economy. There are villages that don't have even the basic necessities such as safe drinking water, primary education and health services. The radiance of 'shining India' never reached them and if some NGO sends a beacon of hope, it is instantly curbed with brutal force by religious extremists.

It has been that in these underdeveloped areas, mainly inhabited by poor tribals, the Naxalism has flourished. Most of them are raised with their rights violated every day. Not just human rights even the fundamental rights ensured by the constitution. Inequality, caste discrimination, conversion issues, re-conversion issues, poverty, physical, sexual and emotional abuse has been part of their daily life. For the people here, the definition of democratic government is not the "government of the people, by the people, for the people.". For them government means, "patwari (revenue officials), police and forest guards." And all of them are only the agents of exploitation.

In order to make the locals understand that governance means doing good to them and not troubling and exploiting them, the government has to reform its policies and change its strategies to bring development in these downtrodden areas. IAS officers and civil servants have to debate over the ways and means that are being adopted by the government to tackle Naxalism.

Mobile media venture gives voice to Gond tribals

2010-04-18T01:41:00.001-07:00

Jashpur (Chhattisgarh), April 18 (IANS) Even as this region hits the headlines for the wrong reasons, in particular the running battle with Maoists, an innovative mobile phone-based media venture is giving a voice to the native and badly exploited Gond tribals and helping them reach out to the rest of India.
CGnet Swara, the mobile phone-based information network, has been launched by Shubhranshu Choudhary, a former BBC producer and currently Knight International Fellow working in what is called the ‘Maoist belt’ bordering Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand.
“The innovative medium makes it possible for anyone to file an audio report or to listen to news reports filed by their fellow citizen journalists,” Choudhary told IANS. The service is soon to be made toll free and can be accessed from anywhere.
“All that they need to do is to dial 080-66932500 from their mobile phone and punch one to record the news report or punch two to listen to the news stories filed earlier,” says Choudhary. This applies to all phones, including landlines.
The audio reports, filed in Gondi, Kuruk, Hindi and Chhattisgarhi languages, get stored on a server located in Bangalore. A team of editors fluent in these languages edit the reports. The edited reports are posted back on the same server for accessing on the mobile phone.
The audio reports are also published on the CGnet.in website with accompanying translation for wider reach.
The medium is already generating great interest. Over 250 audio reports have been filed by citizen journalists since its launch in February this year. Of these, Choudhary’s team has edited and posted 110 reports that have news value. Currently, 60 percent of the reports are in Hindi, but the number of audio reports in Gondi, Kuruk and Chhattisgarhi languages has started going up.
There is also a spike in the number of users accessing the reports on their mobiles. The system has started logging in as many as 50 calls a day, says Choudhary. What impresses Choudhary most is the fact that CGnet Swara has started growing on its own.
“We have made no efforts to promote it so far. It is spreading by word of mouth,” says Choudhary.
Choudhary is also surprised at the “spontaneity” of the reports. “I was planning to hold several training sessions. But people have found a way to use the medium on their own.”
Choudhary believes the innovative medium has the potential to become a bridge between the isolated Gond tribals and mainstream India. “At one level, the tribals can use the platform to communicate with each other in Gondi. At another, their reports can be translated in Hindi and accessed by the rest of the world.”
With a population of over four million, Gonds are the largest tribal group in central India and have unique customs and traditions. They have been caught in the crossfire between Maoists and state forces and have been the hapless victims of violence and exploitation by both sides.
Another major spinoff can be the preservation of Gondi language and the knowledge that has been transferred over centuries by Gonds. “Gondi is very high on Unesco’s endangered list. It has no written tradition and there is a real danger of centuries of knowledge passed by Gonds orally getting lost,” says Choudhary.
Choudhary plans to take CGnet Swara beyond Chhattisgarh. Currently, “CG” in CGnet stands for Chhattisgarh. Choudhary wants to enlarge its scope to central Gondwana so that all tribals living in central India irrespective of their states can make use of it.
The project has been developed with the help of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Microsoft Research India.

In search of inclusive growth

2010-04-16T12:35:00.000-07:00

The burning issue
Growing insurgency from Maoists has put up a serious challenge for steel and mining companies planning to expand their operations in India. The country is heavily banking on these sectors to support its economic growth. Major companies such as Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Posco, ArcelorMittal, NMDC and Vedanta Aluminum besides others have ambitious expansion plans in mineral-rich states like Chhattisgarh, Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Orissa, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. But the growing incident of violent attacks in the recent past has jeopardized their plans. The land acquisition process has also become very complex in India which further aggravates the problem. According to some estimation, delays in approvals for land and mine have stalled more than US$80 billion worth of projects in India that would double steel output.
The government seems to have not been able to address this problem properly that has accumulated over the period of last several decades.

Interestingly, Maoists enjoy strong sympathy from a large section of intellectuals in India. They argue that these people who are mainly tribal have been living in marginalized condition for many years without much of the developments reaching to them. They are not willing to vacate these mineral-rich locations, fearing this will uproot them from their homeland. On the other hand, government says they want to bring the tribals and affected villagers into main stream by rehabilitating them. Sadly, India has a very poor record when it comes to implementing welfare schemes.
The government has very difficult challenge ahead as it looks divided over how to deal with this problem. Many feel the use of arm against these tribals who are part of this country will have serious repercussions in the long run. But there is another section of people who feel violence should be dealt with counter-violence. In between, the price is being paid by ordinary people and the companies who want to put up their plants there.
It’s time for government and other political parties to create consensus among themselves to address the issue seriously. Understandably, such long dragging problem cannot be resolved overnight but the government should draw a road map keeping in mind the interests of all. India needs growth. And steel and coal sectors - besides other mineral driven industries - are going to play a key role here. The government has to make sure these industries grow fearlessly so India could become self reliant. But at the same time it has to ensure that it achieves inclusive growth and that this growth does not come at the cost of shedding blood of its own people.

A disgrace to the village

2010-04-15T11:44:00.000-07:00

In a rare strike against honour-killing, five men get death sentences

ARORA

SHORTLY after they eloped and married, Manoj and Babli Banwala, childhood sweethearts from India’s northern state of Haryana, were dragged from a bus by some of her male relatives, taken to a field near their village of Karora and murdered. Nineteen-year-old Babli was forced to drink pesticide by her brother. Manoj, 23, was garrotted by his bride’s uncle. Their crime, according to the tribal council that ordered the killing, was to have married within the same Hindu clan, or gotra, which many north Indians consider tantamount to incest.

In Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, incautious lovers, especially young women, are quite often murdered by disapproving male relatives. There are estimated to be perhaps several hundred such “honour killings” every year, mostly to rub out the stain of inter-caste or intra-clan liaisons. Karora’s khap panchayat, an unelected taboo-enforcing council, ordered the killing of another same-gotra couple last year; the 27-year-old man was lynched and his body publicly displayed. What is remarkable about the Banwalas’ 2007 case, however, is that the killers have been brought to justice: last month five of Babli’s relatives, including her uncle and brother, were sentenced to death.

Appeals loom and the sentences may not be carried out. Executions rarely are in India. Yet the case has already grabbed much more attention than do most honour-killings. On April 13th 4,000 khap panchayat members gathered to protest against the verdicts. An ugly nexus between politicians, policemen and these self-appointed guardians of tradition—who tend to dominate elected local assemblies as well as unelected caste ones—keeps most honour-killings out of court. The killers of Manoj and Babli were pursued largely at the insistence of the groom’s mother, Chandrapati. The capital sentences—the first ever in an honour-killing case—possibly owe something to the trial-judge being a woman.

In her small brick house Chandrapati shows off a portrait of the newly wedded couple, garlanded with marigolds. She says their murders were witnessed by the local khap leaders, who then ordered her neighbours to ostracise her and her family, or pay a 25,000 rupee ($560) fine. The police, who had been charged to protect the couple, at first refused to register them as missing. But when their bodies turned up in a canal, Chandrapati says she spurned an offer of compensation from the khap leaders and, while fearing retribution, demanded justice. “I am poor but I can’t fix a price for my dead son,” she says.

To get tough on honour killing, the government in Delhi has mooted a new law. But it is not obvious why the police would be any likelier to enforce it. As events in Karora suggest, honour-killing persists at least partly because many villagers approve of it. Surendra Sharma, a 26-year-old tea-seller, says: “The killers did the right thing. This will teach people to respect the sanctity of the brother-sister relationship.” As rural Indians become more mobile and less caste-bound, such attitudes are likely to fade. But it may be a bloody transition.

Tribal project lends a hand to India education aims

2010-04-15T11:24:00.001-07:00

SANTINIKETAN, India (Reuters Life!) – It's an ambitious plan -- giving all children under the age of 6 a free education among India's 1-billion plus population -- but at least one local initiative is making sure millions of tribal people with oral traditions don't get left behind.

In Santiniketan village in West Bengal -- the home of Nobel literature prize winner Rabindranath Tagore -- a voluntary initiative helping local Kora and Santhali tribal children to read and write Bengali is now so popular it needs a second building.

Bengali is the language used in local government schools and many tribal children cannot speak it when they start state school, putting them at a disadvantage and risk that they may fall behind from the start.

The Suchana project operates on a tight budget, using voluntary contributions, and last year, it had to cancel the annual picnic to ensure every rupee was spent for construction of its new three-room building.

This year, the picnic "has to happen, even if it's just rice and daal," says Jhuma Gonrai, one of the teachers.

Suchana hopes to add a second floor to the existing building and a separate structure with a clinic and more latrines -- giving more space for books, art and other learning materials.

Suchana's library has around 1,500 books and the children take one home regularly. There are also now six second-hand computers, given by friends and family, on which older children learn computer skills.

The project is currently working with about 115 children from the Santhal and Kora tribes. In this area in West Bengal, tribal people make up about 18 percent of the population.

In the district of Birbhum, which accounts for about 4 percent of West Bengal's 80 million population, the literacy rate among tribals is about 44 percent for men and a scant 18 percent for women.

Many of the children in these families are the first to go to school. Shanto Kora, another teacher at Suchana, was the first from his Kora village to go to college, where he studied Bengali and history.

Now, he's keen to teach at university and in his spare time plays cricket. "I'm an all-rounder. I'm a spin bowler and I'm good at fielding," Shanto says.

The lack of schooling for tribals is not just a problem in Bengal but in other areas of India where there are peoples with their own languages, often with only an oral tradition.

The Indian government's Education Act of 2009, which came into force on April 1, calls for teaching in the child's mother tongue where possible. But there are few qualified teachers in Santali or Kora -- and little in the way of literature.

Suchana has just published the second-ever book in the Kora language, an alphabet primer, written by Shanto Kora, as part of its efforts to give local children crucial literacy skills.

"It's an alphabet with pictures. We have distributed it to the Kora children," the 28-year-old Shanto says.

"I wanted to teach. I like small children," he adds, sitting cross-legged on the red tiled floor of the building, where children gather in groups with their teachers in the open air or under the wide eaves of the building to learn.

"The first thing all the teachers did when the building was ready was to grab their own special space."

(Editing by Miral Fahmy)

Tribal women protest anti-Maoist operation

2010-04-15T11:23:00.001-07:00

Koraput (Orissa), Apr 15 (PTI) Tribal women today took out a rally in Maoist-hit Narayanpatna in Orissa's Koraput district in protest against proposed special joint anti-Maoist operations in the area.

"Tribals residing in the forests will suffer from the anti-Maoist operations. They will be branded as Maoist supporters and targeted by security forces," the protestors, under the banner of Biplabi Adivasi Mahila Sangha (BAMS) said.

The tribals also put up posters at several places in the district urging the state administration to refrain from such operation.

The protestors handed over a memorandum to officials at the Narayanpatna block office.

The rally was peaceful, police sources said.

This was the second anti-operation rally in the state.

Earlier, tribals in neighbouring Malkangiri district had also opposed the government's plan to launch anti-Maoist operations.

‘I’m not Sonia or PC... I do not represent Maoists or the State’

2010-04-14T22:43:00.000-07:00

Kolkata: “Why do you want to make a Sonia Gandhi out of me?” replied Arundhati Roy, writer and one of the vocal members of the Independent People’s Tribunal that has taken up the cause of Maoists. After Dantewada, would you ask the Maoists to abjure violence and come to the negotiating table? “I am not Chidambaram,” was Roy’s curt answer.

And would you like to mediate should there be negotiations between the Maoists and the Government of India? “I would not. Because I don’t have the skills. I don’t represent the Maoists. I don’t represent the State. I just have an independent opinion,” argued Roy.

At a media interaction in Kolkata on Wednesday afternoon, Roy however, had enough skills to trace an axis of violence that stretched from the Taliban Afghanisthan to the Western Tribal provinces to North East India to Lalgarh and Dantewada.

The story is the same. The resistance taking different shapes and forms from Talibans to Maoists, the writer felt. And almost at the end of a nearly a two-hour press conference when she was repeatedly asked why she did not have a single word of condemnation about the Dantewada massacre of 75 CRPF personnel, Roy said: “ You should stop heckling me.”

The present level of conflict only shows how the tribals are facing the last push. Forget lack of development and malnourishment, they are facing a situation in which they are about to lose their land. But deprivation cannot validate violence, she agreed. “Nothing can validate violence. Maoists have done killings that can’t be justified. How can one justify the beheading of a policeman? There is absolutely no justification.” The rich and the powerful do not go to war against the tribal. “It is the poor pitted against the poor,” she said, trying to rationalise that soldiers who are being sent to fight the Maoists are also poor.

The day’s event was organised by a consortium of 27 political outfits, rights groups, trade unions and included a large number of splintered Naxalite groups.

The Association for Protection of Democratic Rights chief Sujato Bhadra was one of the conveners, as was theatre personality Bivas Chakrabarty. At the media interaction, Gautam Navlakha, Editor of EPW, shared podium with her along with Bhadra and Bivas Chakrabarty. Left historian, Sumit Sarkar also attended the meeting. Bengali author and Magsaysay winner, Mahasweta Devi was supposed to address the meet but had left for Delhi.

A committee was formed by the name of 14 th April Committee and the day’s meeting was described as the inaugural one. Ultra left insiders said there was a move to unite various splintered Naxalite factions and the urban, educated youths who had sympathy for ultra left ideologies.

Asked what could resolve the conflict, Gautam Navlakha and Arundhati Roy said the ban on the CPI (Maoists) should be lifted immediately and the leaders released to give the outfit space to come the negotiating table. Operation Green Hunt has to be stopped and the Centre has to make public all MOUs signed with mining corporations and about SEZs.

The trials of being a tribal

2010-04-14T08:30:00.001-07:00

Caught between the government and the Maoists, tribals in India need to organize into collectives for their common interest

On Monday, news agency PTI reported that families from villages in Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district were fleeing their homes for fear of reprisals from security forces in the aftermath of last week’s massacre at Tadmetla.

This is only the most recent account of the plight of tribals in India’s violence-torn areas. For years, government apathy has resulted in few educational and employment opportunities for them, leading to large-scale poverty and poor living conditions. Added to that, the Maoist menace has meant they have had to exist in an environment of coercion and violence.

Until a few years ago, the Indian administration largely viewed the Maoist problem as somehow manageable. That illusion vanished as a burgeoning Maoist cadre consistently undermined the government. The killings at Tadmetla are a brutal pointer to that might.

Indeed, as the struggle for dominance between the state and the insurgents has heated up, both sides have increasingly used tribals as instruments in their power battles. On the one hand, the Salwa Judum example shows that as security forces have stumbled, the government has taken recourse to pitting tribals against tribals, at times forcefully. On the other, Maoists have used tribals as human shields, letting the innocent bear the brunt of the casualties.

At one level, it is a problem of agency—at fault is the tribals’ fragmentary existence that makes individuals vulnerable to external forces. It is interesting here to look at a recent interview of Elinor Ostrom, the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in economics. Ostrom builds on cooperation as the driving force of coordination, and suggests that small communities can work towards the common good provided they cooperate and communicate effectively.

Ostrom’s model has some resonance for the tribals’ situation in India. Decades of disenfranchisement and lack of empowerment have left tribals in India’s conflict zones without a voice. Their political leaders are either absent or too far removed to effectively represent them. Politically, they are orphans. In this situation, the ability to organize into organic communities, even on a small scale, can do much to help the tribals’ cause. More importantly, it will give them the ability to project themselves on their own terms, and not as they are represented by either the state or the insurgents.

Help us, say tribals in India's new war zone

2010-04-13T09:41:00.001-07:00

Dantewada (Chhattisgarh), April 13 (IANS) Exactly one week has passed since Maoists butchered 76 security personnel in the forests of Dantewada. Hundreds of thousands of poor tribals in the Bastar region fear that the villages and forests they have called home for centuries are about to turn into India's deadliest war zone.

Thousands of security personnel deployed in the restive areas of Chhattisgarh's southern parts may be looking for revenge. The tribals fear they will bear the brunt even as the Maoists too are gearing for an intensified battle.

'Everyone in the forested villages of Bastar is horrified after the April 6 massacre. Living with family members in peace has been just a dream for us since the late 1980s when 'dadas' (Maoists) sneaked into Bastar from Andhra Pradesh. This was followed by frequent visits by police parties into villages to track them down,' Lokhan Sodhi, 58, of Bhusaras village in Dantewada, told IANS.

The Bastar region is made up of five districts - Kanker, Narayanpur, Bastar, Bijapur and Dantewada. Spread over 40,000 sq km, it is home to an estimated 3.5 million people of which nearly 80 percent is tribal.

'The Bastar interiors have turned into India's deadliest war zone now, about a million tribal people are caught between the police and Naxals (Maoists) in the interiors,' said Manish Kunjam, based in Dantewada district and president of the Akhil Bharatiya Adivasi Mahasabha, an umbrella organisation of tribal groups.

'But the most unfortunate part is no solution seems to be in sight when you see the insurgency problem from the tribal peoples' viewpoint. After the CRPF men's killing, civilian suffering will touch a new high in the coming months.'

The Bastar tribes live in pathetic conditions - they travel barefoot, live in bare minimum huts and largely rely on forest produce for livelihood. They are completely cut off from development schemes, roads, schools and health facilities. Around 25,000 sq km of Bastar is intensively mined.

'Life has become a nightmare for us, we are caught between the dadas and the policemen, we never seek any help from either the government or the dadas but just pray that they allow us to live in our huts in peace,' said Poriam Boje, 39, of one of the worst leftist violence-hit Jagargunda areas in Dantewada.

'But with things going the way they are, we fear the worst is in store. We are crying for help from both sides but no one is ready to rescue us.'

As per estimates of the Chhattisgarh police department, the region houses up to 50,000 Maoists, including village-level members and some 10,000 armed cadres in its thickly forested terrain.

Tribunal & tribals

2010-04-13T01:40:00.001-07:00

From the grandiosely self-titled Independent People’s Tribunal held in New Delhi, one might have come away curiously (and disturbingly) enlightened: that Operation Green Hunt is reminiscent of the McCarthy-era anti-communist witch hunts, or even the Vietnam War. (Where’s the napalm, one might ask.) It’s a war on the environment; a colonial persecution of marginalised peoples. The “consumerist” middle class is now “a grave threat to national security”. While the gamut of “activist” dislike for the state may appear to turn all logic on its head, it’s necessary to engage with this discourse to show where, and how, it misreads and misrepresents.

That India’s tribal communities are a national asset, uniquely enriching our “human biodiversity”, was never contested. That’s why their welfare must be disengaged from the Maoists and those same old activists allegedly crusading in their behalf. The latter, who claim to represent the marginalised, indulge in their own marginalisation — in omitting reference to Maoist violence or merely paying it lip service. They collate the facts that the “red corridor” overlaps not just some of the least developed districts but also some of the richest in natural and mineral wealth in arguing that Maoists are Robin Hoods providing the abject what the state doesn’t. Unsurprisingly, Maoists grew in influence where the state was the least visible. But Maoist activity has been a tale of obstructing the rule of law and development, destroying infrastructure, arson, extortion, kidnappings and executions, culminating in last week’s massacre of 76 security personnel.

In taking the anti-statist argument further, the “tribunal” also recommended replacing our development model — “exploitative”, “not suitable for the country” — by a “participatory” one, emphasising “agriculture and the rural sector”. Well, India has faulted in failing to take development to tribals, not in imposing development. Nor is it feasible to deprive the economy of resources it needs. Whoever extends the Avatar logic to preserving tribals in their “pristine” state, depriving them of the benefits of economic development, cannot be their friend. Leaving tribals “alone” is too romantic a notion that dangerously connives with Maoist bloodlust, which aims to ultimately overthrow the democratic state — ironically it is only a democratic state that allows the freedom of speech on display here. Restoring civil administration can initiate development and uplift the tribals — Maoists oppose that uplift since it’s their ticket to redundancy.

It's tribal faith vs Vedanta might in Kalahandi forests

2010-04-13T01:29:00.001-07:00

LANJIGARH/BHAWANIPATNA: Kalahandi has always captured the national imagination, but never for the right reasons. Recurring poverty deaths and reports about entire communities surviving on mango kernels defined this predominantly tribal district in southern Orissa for decades.

So when the London-listed, Indian-run miner Vedanta Plc announced plans in 2002 to set up a Rs 4,000-crore bauxite refinery and bauxite mining project in the district's Niyamgiri hills, there was a feeling in New Delhi and Bhubaneswar that Kalahandi was finally climbing on to the development bandwagon.

“A big company was coming to Kalahandi... It would make the district into something like Kolkata or Mumbai. That's how we felt then,” said local journalist Mahamad Ashlam.

Eight years on, Ashlam is a disappointed man. It is a feeling shared by Kalahandi's elected representatives, people living near the refinery, the local middle class and the business community. The company, too, says it is disappointed because the refinery can break even only if the state government acts on its promise to let it mine in the bauxite-rich Niyam Dongar mountain.

Vedanta wants the flat-top mountain massif, the best-forested in the Niyamgiri hill range, but the local Dongria Kondh tribals say it is the abode of their god Niyam Raja. The surreal fight between the $12.3-billion mining firm and tribals facing extinction has already drawn parallels with James Cameron's blockbuster film Avatar.

The David-versus-Goliath battle has drawn in a variety of actors—from tribals to environmentalists to politicians to non-government organisations. Even the Church of England waded into the controversy, selling its stake in the company last February to protest the company's allegedly poor human rights record.

The battle is being fought against the backdrop of raging Maoist violence in tribal areas across several Indian states, which means a decision on whether to let the company mine the Niyam Dongar will not be an easy one.

The government, increasingly having to reckon with deep disenchantment felt by several tribal communities about the country's industrialisation agenda, will be forced to confront the issue soon. The environment ministry's Forest Advisory Committee, which advises the government on whether forestland should be diverted for non-forest use, will meet on April 16, after which it will submit its recommendations to the ministry to take the final call.

As D-day approaches, it is instructive to know just how Vedanta got here. To understand that question, and to make sense of the claims and counterclaims made by the company and the local community, ET traveled to Kalahandi last month.

Tatas to do social audit of Orissa project

2010-04-13T01:28:00.001-07:00

Tata Steel is to form a committee to undertake a social audit of its Kalinganagar project in Orissa, in a bid to counter allegations on the negative impact of industrialisation.
Said H M Nerurkar, managing director of Tata Steel [ Get Quote ]: "We will form a committee comprising eminent persons to undertake a social audit. I am willing to do this audit for the next five years. Financial impact of the project on the livelihood of the people and medical help will be monitored."
He was responding to queries from the media on allegations of human rights' exploitation in the project. Tata Steel does a voluntary social audit for the Jamshedpur operations every 10 years.
Tata Steel signed a memorandum of understanding with the Orissa government for the Kalinganagar project in November 2004. More than five years on, 300 families are yet to be moved from the site.
The project saw violent agitation against land acquisition in 2006, when police firing killed 14 tribals.
Human rights activists have blamed industrial projects for displacing tribals, a cause taken up by Naxalites [ Images ] on a war-footing, literally.
According to a recent Citigroup report, tribals are among the biggest victims of displacement. Although they comprise nine per cent of the population, their land is 40 per cent of the land acquired till date.
Nerurkar admitted Naxalite movements had local support. "There is a dissatisfied lot," he said.
"Tata Steel wants to adjust to this issue by working with the communities. We have been doing this for 100 years and will continue to do it."

Caught in crossfire, Chhattisgarh tribes traumatised

2010-04-12T23:30:00.000-07:00

By Sujeet Kumar
Dantewada (Chhattisgarh), April 12 (IANS) Hundreds of impoverished tribal families caught in the crossfire between security forces and Maoists in the vast forested terrain of Bastar are feeling traumatised, with many deserting their homes in anticipation of an intensified conflict.
They fear the area will turn into a “war zone” in the coming weeks after the Maoists massacred 75 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troopers and one policeman April 6 in Chintalnar forest.
“We are leaving our houses, everyone is in a rush to desert their village because all are believe that CRPF may attack Mukram village and other areas of Chintalnar forest where the troopers had a night stay before being killed by ‘dadas’ (Maoists). Police may think we tipped off the dadas about the CRPF night halt that day,” Poriam Bella, an 18-year-old resident of Mukram village, told IANS.
Fear runs deep in the minds of these tribals in the 40,000 sq km economically backward Bastar area, of which up to 25,000 sq km is believed to be intensively mined.
They are afraid they may be killed by police after being branded as Maoists or by Maoists after being called police informers.
An elderly resident of Chintagufa said: “There is no end to our agony. About 50,000 people had been left homeless by Salwa Judum (a government backed civil militia movement launched in June 2005), but life was beginning to look up for a few month as some tribals were beginning to return.
“But now a strong rumour that the CRPF may go after civilians for allegedly supporting Maoists has returned to haunt,” he said.
The feeling of CRPF revenge attacks has also gripped a stretch from Sukma area in Dantewada district on national highway 221 down to Konta towards Andhra Pradesh via Dornapal.
Bastar is made up of five districts - Dantewada, Bijapur, Narayanpur, Bastar and Kanker - and is known as one of India’s most impoverished pockets.
“The Bastar region is clearly dubbed as India’s nerve centre of Maoist terrorism, up to 25,000 sq km of area is intensively mined, explosives exist six feet below the ground,” said Vishwa Ranjan, Chhattisgarh director general of police.
He said police has taken out 1,010 mines from the Bastar jungles since 2004 but the rebels have filled it with explosives again.

The Jarawa Tribals of the Andaman Islands

2010-03-30T11:11:00.001-07:00

Living on the Verge of Extinction

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Mar 29, 2010 Sharmishta Sarkar

The Jarawas resisted contact with the outside world until 1998. Now with barely 350 individuals left, they struggle to hold on to their way life and to survive.

The Jarawa tribe of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands are thought to be the descendants of the first group of people who successfully migrated out of Africa. They are short, dark-skinned and have curly hair, resembling the African bushmen to some extent. Along with the other indigenous peoples of the Indian island chain of the Andamans, the Jarawas have inhabited the islands for several thousand years as nomadic hunter-gatherers, and have managed to to keep to themselves until very recently when the Indian government sanctioned the building of the Andaman Trunk Road. It was only in 1998 that the Jarawas began to come out of the forests to visit nearby villages and towns.

Relationship of Jarawas with Outsiders

Other than the indigenous peoples of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the first known settlements of non-Jarawas was during the British Raj. There are traceable notes on the contact of the tribals of the islands during the colonial age in India's history. Around the mid 1700s, many populations of the Jarawas were wiped out due to disease, alcoholism and British government sponsored attacks after the first British settlement was established on or near their land. The remaining Jarawas settled elsewhere. But with increased migrations from the Indian and Burmese mainland the process of decimation of the tribes accelerated. As the non-indigenous population on the islands increased, the tribals attacked people wandering around and killed many of them, their attempt in keeping their independence and distance from the outside world.
In the 1970s, the Indian government sanctioned the building of the Andaman Trunk Road, allowing the outside world to reach the domain of the Jarawas. Prior to 1997, they managed to stay to themselves. But since then, they have initiated contact with the non-indigenous peoples of the islands. This contact has further reduced their population due to diseases like measles and tuberculosis. Today there are barely 200 to 300 individuals living in the jungles of the Andaman Islands.

Problems Faced by the Jarawa Tribes

The main threat of for the Jarawas comes from the encroachment onto their land enabled by the Andaman Trunk Road. The road has brought settlers looking for agricultural land, poachers and loggers into the forest home of the tribals. The encroachment has brought disease epidemics as well. A few months after the Jarawas initiated contact with the outside world, an epidemic of measles broke out, followed by another in 2006. The tribals have also suffered epidemics of tuberculosis. With no immunity to most of the common diseases plaguing modern society, the Jarawas have had to suffer many disease-related deaths.
Poachers have greatly reduced the game that the tribes depend on for their daily subsistence. There have also been reports of sexual exploitation of the Jarawa women by poachers and tour operators in the area.

It is illegal for tourists to photograph or initiate any contact with the Jarawas, who are found begging by the side of the highways. Despite warnings to tour operators to discourage contact with the indigenous peoples, there has been no action taken against the perpetrators. Although the Indian government has demarcated land for the Jarawas, encroachment has not stopped. When a buffer zone of 5 kilometres was created, many villages and resorts had to be relocated resulting in several cases going to court.
In May 2002, the Indian Supreme Court ordered the road to be closed, the settlements relocated and banned logging. Implementing this law has been difficult and the survival of Jarawas is still a struggle. Many non-profit organizations have tried to take up their cause but have not achieved much. In fact, some of them have been criticized for using the Jarawas as a fund-raising gimmick to ensure profits for themselves.

Sources

BBC News. 28 March 2010. Battle over resort 'Threatening Andaman Tribe' Retrieved 29 March 2010
The South Asian.com February 2003. Jarawa of Andaman Islands Retrieved 29 March 2010

Road work begins in Orissa industrial hub opposed by tribals

2010-03-30T11:10:00.001-07:00

Bhubaneswar, March 30

Four years after 14 protesters were killed in police firing in Kalinga Nagar in Orissa's Jajpur district, the authorities Monday started construction for a common corridor road in an industrial area opposed by local tribals.
About 25 platoons of police forces were deployed as the district administration started construction in Kalinga Nagar industrial area.
"We have started construction work for the common corridor road that is needed for the industry. Many people die in accidents there every year. The road will reduce congestion and minimize accidents," district Superintendent of Police D.S. Kutte said.
The administration Sunday met the tribals, who were represented by Bisthapan Virodhi Jana Manch (BVJM), to solve the issue of their displacement.
"We are not using force. The discussions are going on, so are the construction works. But anybody found resorting to violence will not be spared. We will certainly take action," Kutte added.
The 12,000-acre Kalinga Nagar complex, about 100 km away from Bhubaneswar, has about 10 industrial units and steel plants. The BVJM is opposing the construction of common corridor road, considered the lifeline of the Kalinga Nagar industrial hub.
In January 2006, 14 people were killed in Kalinga Nagar in Jajpur district when police opened fire during a protest by villagers against acquisition of land for industry.

India’s Tribal Citizens Use New Cell Phone Network to Produce Local News

2010-03-29T12:54:00.001-07:00

In partnership with UNICEF, MIT and Microsoft, Knight Fellow’s project revolutionizes journalism at grassroots level

Dozens of citizen journalists in India’s chronically neglected tribal communities are producing and sharing audio news reports for the first time through an innovative cell phone system launched by a Knight International Journalism Fellow.

Watch video about Knight Fellow Shubhranshu Choudhary's work with tribal citizen journalists.

Members of India’s 80-million-strong Adivasi tribal community now have easy access through their mobile phones to reports on important issues such as housing evictions, police abuse and rural education. Knight International Journalism Fellow Shubhranshu Choudhary is pioneering this breakthrough initiative in partnership with UNICEF, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Microsoft Research India. The goal: To create a way for this isolated community to share information. If successful, this system could be replicated in isolated communities around the world.

After the citizen journalists are trained to produce audio reports, their stories are shared on the CGnet Swara network, a phone-message system where community information and news is posted after it is vetted by professional journalists. CGnet Swara was founded by Choudhary to be a voice for the tribal communities of Chhattisgarh. The reports are available through a new transmission system, developed with MIT’s Latif Alam and Microsoft Research India’s Bill Thies.

The beauty of the system is that it bypasses the Internet. Instead, it uses cell phone software that transmits these audio reports using technology that normally delivers text messages. The reports are produced in local languages such as Kudukh and Gondi spoken by Adivasi tribes. This is especially important because India bans all radio news except on the government station. This project allows people who previously had no access to news due to language or literacy barriers to receive independent audio news for the first time. Two months after the launch, the new system had logged more than 1,600 calls and 80 comments.

“Though Gondi is spoken by 2.7 million people, according to an Indian census, this is the first news outlet in the Gondi language in any form,” said Choudhary. He plans to expand the training to four other states in the Dandakaranya region where Adivasis speak Gondi, which is on UNESCO’s most-endangered-language list.

This new system also allows people with limited access to computers and even to electricity to share news. Anyone with a cell phone can listen to the reports. Users simply respond to voice prompts, so they do not have to be literate to access the reports.

The initiative received national coverage in a major newspaper, The Hindu, and won praise from independent journalists. “It will revolutionize journalism at the grassroots level,” said veteran journalist Sudhir Pattnaik, in an email to Choudhary. Pattnaik is editor of the Samadrist news magazine and chairman of Independent Media, a group of filmmakers, writers and journalists who develop alternative media initiatives in the eastern state of Orissa.

While services for accessing information over the phone are not new, this system is one of the first that enables callers to contribute their own content to the network, said Microsoft’s Thies. He said he hopes villagers contributing their own content over the phone will develop vibrant mobile communities that share and discuss locally relevant news in their native languages.

Choudhary and his partners recently tested the service in a dusty courtyard at the end of a rutted road in Kunkuri, a village in the state of Chhattisgarh. The 33 pioneering citizen journalists used their cell phones to record and call two-minute news reports in to a message system. Seasoned journalists vet the reports before they are made public to CGNet Swara network members and anyone else interested in tribal community news.

Prior to the launch, Choudhary taught participants the basics of journalism including the “who, what, where, when, why and how” that are the foundation of news stories. He also explained how to conduct interviews, crosscheck information and create audio reports. The training session was funded by UNICEF and hosted by local NGO Jan Vikas Sanstha, which focuses on issues including health, education and job creation for disadvantaged people.

Participant Samir Xalxo said he became interested in the network when he got an invitation to join the citizen journalist training session. “I never heard of this before, so I was curious,” said Xalxo, 32, a tribal farmer. He said his interest in citizen journalism was sparked after a local reporter for a mainstream media outlet refused to run a story about an incident that happened in his region. Xalxo said he now hopes to transform his frustration over this incident into action. Choudhary said the Adivasis’ strong oral story telling tradition combined with the wide use of cell phones in the region makes CGnet Swara a great news-sharing platform for this community.

While the main objective of CGnet Swara is to create a news outlet for tribal communities, a secondary goal is to share reports about tribal issues with local and national media. To achieve this, Choudhary will post information from CGnet Swara on a separate Web site, CGnet, which he launched in 2004 to highlight tribal issues in Chhattisgarh.

Language lab to assist tribal children

2010-03-28T00:06:00.000-07:00

LOHARDAGA: A noted private school here has launched a digital English language lab to assist tribal children in learning English.

The school has non-tribal students also but majority of students are tribals and are from poor educational background.

Fr Thomas Powthil, the administrator of the school said, "The school first started special classes to understand the problems of the students. Through special classes, teachers come to know the actual problem of students. Our effort helped us in enhancing the learning ability of those students but the pronunciation was still a problem. So we launched a separate lab for them. The lab has a special device-English language corrector-that guides students to read, write and speak correct English" said Powthil adding this lab is helping in achieving the target.

He said correct pronunciation is also important as the school has to respond to an ongoing cultural exchange programme with Klein Seminarie, the house where Fr Leivens had done his schooling at Roeselare in Belgium.

This is the third year when 20 plus-two level students will come by July this year. They reside here for several days and learn the cultural values.

Left parties failed to protect tribals, say intellectuals

2010-03-27T03:58:00.003-07:00

The Left parties have failed to protect the interests of tribals whose land and livelihood are being threatened by industrialists, and Maoists have seized the opportunity to grab their support, said intellectuals and activists here Friday.

The government machinery in collusion with the big corporates have systematically acquired, appropriated and grabbed tribal land and forests and the mainstream Left parties have failed to do anything, they said at a round table here.

'The branded Left has completely failed,' said D. Bandopadhyay, one of the main speakers at the conference organised by the Centre for Policy Analysis.

They also cited the example of West Bengal's ruling Left Front's failed attempt to forcibly acquire farm land for industrialists in Nandigram and Singur.

They said the concept of capital mode of development has created Maoism in the country.

The tribals are experiencing a profound disenchantment not only with the governments of the day but with the Indian state, they said, while criticising Green Hunt, a massive security operation launched by the government against Maoists in affected states.

The Maoists have seized upon the tribals' alienation and declared an open war against the state. The rebels are garnering growing support in the hills and forests, the traditional home to the tribals, the speakers observed.

Sudha Bharadwaj, a human rights activist, said the country was 'witnessing adivasi genocide' in the name of operation Green Hunt, particularly in Chhattisgarh.

She said many innocent tribal people were killed by the forces in the name of hunting Maoists.

Prof. Kamal Mitra Chenoy said the Maoists are resisting operation Green Hunt and are getting mass support.

'They (the Maoists) are resisting it. They are getting support from the masses,' Chenoy said.

He asked the Left parties to concentrate 'much more on mass struggle for land, livelihood and habitat'.

Chenoy criticised the Left parties for launching only urban centric resistence like the fight against price rise and advised them to concentrate more on the struggle in rural India.

Presenjith Bose, a Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) ideologue, questioned the Maoists' motive and said 'they lack the understanding how to conduct a mass movement'.

'What for are the Maoists fighting,' he asked, and added that poor people who are workers of the CPI-M in West Bengal are being killed by Maoists in the name of revolution.

'Is this revolution? The Maoists way is not definitely a way ahead. The Left has to move in the democratic direction,' he said.

He, however, agreed that operation Green Hunt may have the backing of capital.

Gujjars seek Sonia Gandhi's intervention against anti-tribal Bill

2010-03-24T05:56:00.001-07:00

By Tahir Nadeem Khan

Seeking immediate intervention of Congress President Sonia Gandhi against anti-reservation policies, the All India Gujjar Mahasabha has strongly opposed the controversial Bill move by the government to ban inter-district recruitment in the State and said the Bill is anti tribal.
In a statement issued by State President of Mahasabha, Eshfaq-ur- Rehman Poswal said the Scheduled Tribes constitute over 20 per cent of the population and this Bill will directly hit their interests. Hence he said we have sought intervention of Sonia Gandhi as the Bill will definitely jeopardize the avenues of employment available to ST population of the State.
Poswal further said they will launch a statewide crusade against the Bill adding that banning of inter district recruitment would elbow out the Gujjars in over all competition of employments.
He said the Bill is against the spirit of the Constitution and contrary to the laws of reservations as lay down in Indian constitution for those who are otherwise neglected.
He said in past thousand of vacancies were de-reserved due to non availability of candidate but with opening of inter district recruitment ST candidates were applying everywhere in the State but now the anti-reservation forces were bent upon to grab our rights by introducing banning inter district recruitment Bill.
He further said that we demand that the present system of recruitment to continue. e asked all 12 tribal communities to unite against the anti-reservation Bill.
Poswal also made an appeal to Chief Minister Omar Abdullah to seek his favor to bring to an end to anti tribal Bill.