The Forest Rights Act and The Battle for India's Forests

The Wire, 2021

The Union environment ministry called for expressions of interest from consultancies on April 8, 2021, to prepare a draft comprehensive amendment to the Indian Forest Act 1927. Will fortress conservation make a legal comeback? And will Parliament collaborate in this disaster?

Planet Earth, 2010

The Council for Social Development (CSD) in its Summary Report on Implementation of the Forest Rights Act released in September 2010, forthrightly states that "All of the key features of this legislation have been undermined by a combination of apathy and sabotage during the process of implementation. ... Unless immediate remedial measures are taken, instead of undoing the historical injustice to tribal and other traditional forest dwellers, the Act will have the opposite outcome of making them even more vulnerable to eviction and denial of their customary access to forests. The testimonies made it clear that this is not merely a result of bureaucratic failure; both the Central and the State governments have actively pursued policies that are in direct violation of the spirit and letter of the Act." This first ever national report from any source on this subject, candidly spells out what has happened and what should be done. The Its implementation heralded a new beginning in the conservation of forests, yet the Forest Rights Act has been diluted by factors that vary from complete apathy to lack of regulatory control. C R Bijoy takes the Council for Social Development's (CSD) Summary Report on Implementation of the Forest Rights Act as a base to highlight the problem areas.

It argues that the forest right legislation needs to be extended to assist in tribal development. The various initiatives taken by civil society, NGOs and government have led to greater access and control of forest resources by local people. As a result, there has been some improvement in forest protection and management and reduction of pressure on natural resources. Substantial swathes of degraded forests have been rehabilitated and new forests have been planted. Local people have started supporting forest conservation where they have been able to reap financial returns from benefit-sharing schemes.

Online , 2013

The very enactment of the historic Forest Rights Act, 2006 by the Indian Parliament in the country after the 60 years of India's independence is a landmark constitutional reform. Campaign for Survival and Dignity (CSD) played a vital role in mobilizing the tribals, forest dwellers and people's representatives at different levels in whole country and successfully got this Act passed by the Indian Parliament which admitted for the first time in the history of India to have done historical injustice to the tribals and forest dwellers before and after India's independence. We believe that FRA aims at reddressal of a numbers of problems arose due to the draconian Acts like Indian Forest Act, 1927 and Land Acquisition Land, 1894 which were used to evict the tribals and the forest dwellers from their homes and shelters like goats and cattle. The Forest Rights Act, 2006 not only revived the tribal self governance regime in scheduled 5 th area enforced by the Central PESA Act, 1996 but also it extended the provisions of the PESA even to the non scheduled area(whole State) empowering the Village Council, the Gram Sabha to decide over their fate and fate of their resources which has been upheld by the Supreme Court, the highest Court of the nation in the Niyamgiri case on 18 th April 2013. All the State's Apparatus has now to accept that "Gram Sabha" is the lowest unit or form of "Government" having its own exclusive legislative, executive and judicial power and authority over its stipulated areas like any other forms of Government at Block, District, State and Central level. The FRA has also raised fundamental questions over the ongoing Panchyatitaj systems; representative system runs in different State and aims at implementation of direct democracy sidelining the over empowered bureaucracy. Forest Rights Act, 2006 has also challenged the age-old State hegemony over forest protection and conservation in the name of "scientific forest management" and has strengthen the conservation regime handing it to the community people who live and die in the forest.

Study to Document the violations in the implementation of the Forest Rights and options being locally worked out by Civil Society and communities to assert their rights in general and Community Forest Rights in particular, 2020

The study documents systematically the implementation of Forest Rights Act (FRA)2006 across the country covering 11 states. There is a gross violation of the following the constitutional provisions of FRA in the sphere of conservation of forest and enhancement of forest-based sustainable livelihood is being continued for long that demands the immediate attention of the legislative and the judiciary. The role of Civil Society organisations and the groups of activists is crucial in this matter. All India Front for Forest Rights Struggles (AIFFRS) in collaboration with the Indian School of Business (ISB) documented the situation on the ground and help AIFFRS to prepare a concerted strategy for the future.

This paper is focused on IFA law and its need.

2020

The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Rights) Act, 2006, also known as the Forest Rights Act (FRA), has been in force for the last 13 years. While the evolution and impact of forest tenure rights in Latin America, parts of Africa, Indonesia, and Nepal have been analysed and documented widely, India's legal experiment to recognise the ownership, use, access, and management rights of forest-dwelling communities relating to forest land is yet to be comprehensively analysed. This article provides an overview of the history, processes, and socio-economic implications of the FRA. Analysis of data on the status of FRA implementation from 2008 to 2020 reveals that its enforcement has been very uneven across the country. The article examines the factors determining the uneven implementation of FRA through case studies from three States. It is based on fieldwork and discussions with key stakeholders involved in the implementation of FRA in Odisha, Maha...