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ManishSrivastav
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The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers Act, 2006 (FRA), was enacted in 2007. It was meant to undo the "historic injustice to forest dwelling communities" and was meant to recognise pre-existing forest rights only as on December 13, 2005. The Act covers not just tribal populations but also other forest dwellers.
Only those actually occupying forest land as on December 13, 2005, are eligible to be granted rights as per this law. Further, people belonging to the Other Traditional Forest Dwellers category-non-tribals who form the bulk of the claimants-have to establish a continuous 75-year occupation for eligibility.
On February 13, 2019, the Supreme Court issued a landmark order to ensure the protection of forests that have been severely affected due to ineligible or bogus claimants under FRA. The order states that all persons whose claims have been rejected after following due process laid down in FRA, need to be evicted.
Under FRA, a detailed process is required to be followed for validating or rejecting any claim. The first layer of scrutiny is done by the gram sabha. No forest officer, wildlife or environmental NGO is part of this process. Neither is the ministry of environment and forests involved. If a claim is rejected by the gram sabha, the appeal lies with a committee held at the sub-divisional level. A further appeal can be made to a third committee chaired by the district collector. Importantly, there is no provision for appeal against the final order of this committee.
As per the September 2018 statement compiled by the ministry of tribal affairs based on data provided by the state governments, 42 lakh claims over forest lands, including within national parks, sanctuaries and other protected areas, were filed by tribals and OTFDs. Based on these claims, 18,89,835 titles have been granted over 72,23,132 hectares of forest land. These forests have been given mainly to individuals, as well as to communities in bits and pieces across the country. This has led not just to diversion of forest lands for agriculture but also in the fragmentation of forest areas, national parks and sanctuaries.