One landmark law, the Right to Information Act, has helped over a thousand Adivasis in north Maharashtra in getting closer to their rights under another landmark law – the Forest Rights Act. The latter was legislated in 2006 giving forest dwelling and other Adivasi communities individual and community rights to lands they had traditionally cultivated and occupied. But communities in rural India have faced an uphill battle in getting the...
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In the name of development -Anupama Katakam
-Frontline Riding roughshod over farmers' concerns, the Gujarat government notifies a project to develop the Mandal-Becharaji Special Investment Region, an industrial hub spread over 50,884 hectares, affecting 44 villages. But the villagers see it as a real estate scam and are determined to resist it. GUJARAT may soon have several new townships. The Narendra Modi-led government has proposed to set up 13 special investment regions (SIRs), which are essentially industrial hubs...
More »When teachers demanded double the mid-day meal for children on Mondays
-The Hindu Mumbai: On his trip to the Adivasi belt of Thane, teachers who got wind of journalist P. Sainath's (The Hindu's Rural Affairs Editor) visit approached him with a problem. "Could you please ask the government to provide twice the amount of mid-day meal on Monday? After the Friday afternoon meal, our children starve over the weekend. No teacher is willing to teach this bunch of kids whose bellies are...
More »Eviction drive turns deadly, tribal falls victim-Pheroze L Vincent
-The Hindu BHATTIDHANA (M.P.): On July 28, a task force threw out around 70 Gond Adivasis from a nursery of fruit trees in a reserve forest in Madhya Pradesh Gond Adivasis wiped the wrinkled face of the late Bishan Dhurve with turmeric water, washing away the bits of coagulated blood on his forehead. The wound, his son Dikchand said, was inflicted by the Forest Department, which evicted around 70 tribal people who...
More »Forests of the night -Christophe Jaffrelot
-The Indian Express How Chhattisgarh became a sanctuary, and then a laboratory, for Naxals Some time ago, Chhattisgarh hit the headlines because of a Maoist attack on state Congress leaders, in which V.C. Shukla and Mahendra Karma died. Since then, the Congress has accused the BJP government of a conspiracy, and some BJP leaders have accused former chief minister Ajit Jogi of being part of a conspiracy himself. Politicising this tragic episode...
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