-The Indian Express Baigas in court against order issued by govt of undivided MP Achanakmar: “THAK GAYI (I am tired),” says Ranichand Baiga, 26. She was married at 15, and in a tribe where non-surgical contraceptives are still unheard of, has since had eight children. Two, she says, died of illness. On her arm, outside her one-room home in the core zone of the Achanakmar Tiger Reserve, is her youngest son, Surya,...

-The Hindu Ministry report names groups opposed to mining and sale of tribal land The Home Ministry has said in its annual report that at least two civil rights groups working for tribal people in Odisha and Jharkhand were allegedly acting as a front organisation for the Maoists and were using “displacement of local communities” as their main plank. The Niyamgiri Suraksha Samiti (NSS) in Odisha and the Visthapan Virodhi Jan Vikas Andolan...

-TheWire.in Since coming into effect 21 years ago, PESA has been grossly misused and underutilised, disenfranchising Adivasi communities all over the country. In India, tribal communities have had a long history of struggle, including during the colonial rule. In fact, the tribal war for independence has largely been ignored in the popular history of independent India. Today, most of us are not aware that the war of independence started as early as...

-VillageSquare.in Recent amendments to laws that govern the use of land owned by tribals in Jharkhand has led to a rash of protests because local communities feel that they might lose their land and livelihoods to industrial development Last year in May, when the Jharkhand government announced to remove handcuffs from all the statues and pictures of Birsa Munda, the indigenous people of the state lauded the newly appointed first non-tribal chief...

-Livemint.com Lessons learnt from the Right to Food case can be applied for other social issues that end up at the Supreme Court’s doorstep every day New Delhi: In 2001, 47 tribals and Dalits were starved to death in south-eastern Rajasthan as the state reeled from its third consecutive year of drought. The tragedy occurred despite India’s warehouses were brimming with an excess of around 40 million tonnes of foodgrains that year. Weeks...