New Agasthyamalai eviction orders continue to silence Forest Rights Act
Angry outbursts and tears of desperation swept the hillsides in the Agasthyamalai Biosphere Reserve (ABR), particularly in Theni district. In the last few weeks, the
Angry outbursts and tears of desperation swept the hillsides in the Agasthyamalai Biosphere Reserve (ABR), particularly in Theni district. In the last few weeks, the Forest Department has issued eviction notices to thousands of households on the Tamil Nadu side alleging they had encroached on forest land. Based on the findings and recommendations of the Central Empowered Committee (CEC), the Supreme Court directed a time-bound encroachment eviction plan, rehabilitation where applicable, legal action against willful violators, and post-eviction ecological restoration. It also imposed additional penalties against 118 government servants found to be encroachers, and ordered the dismantling of all structures, utilities, logistical facilities, etc. within encroached forest areas. Finally, the Bench prohibited the diversion of forest land or the start of new non-forest activities within the ABR until all encroachments had been removed. Likewise, it granted immunity from prosecution to all forest, police, revenue, and other officials involved in surveying, demarcating, and removing encroachments as part of this exercise except in cases involving mala fide or arbitrary action. Significantly, the Court directed the CEC to recommend the deployment of paramilitary forces if the Tamil Nadu government failed to comply with the Court’s directions. The State is also to decide on the utilisation, retention, relocation or removal of all infrastructure and other establishments belonging to the Bombay Burmah Trading Corporation, Ltd. (BBTCL) in the Kalakkad Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve, in consultation with the CEC. Historical injustice Parliament enacted the Forest Rights Act in 2006 to undo the historical injustice suffered by forest dwellers. It recognised and vested forest rights on forest-dwelling Scheduled Tribes and other traditional forest dwellers who had occupied forest land before December 13, 2005. The FRA provided for a transparent process for these individuals to claim their individual and community rights, to be verified and approved by gram sabhas.
Si member sub-division- and district-level committees — with representatives from the Revenue, Tribal, and Forest Departments and the elected members of panchayats — have to examine the claims and issue titles. Those forest land occupations that didn’t fall within the FRA’s scope could then become the actual encroachment. But over the years, State governments, the CEC, the Forest Departments, and even the Supreme Court have ignored this basic legal fact. Despite the FRA having operated for two decades, no official has asked for data on forest land occupation falling outside the FRA’s scope nor has such information been presented to the public — making the data presented on encroachment and encroachers in any forum suspect. In fact, in the recent hearings, the Supreme Court should have hauled up the recalcitrant State governments for poor FRA implementation. The Tribal Department, which is the nodal department to implement the Act, has also been problematically silent over these infirmities. The FRA also prohibits authorities from evicting people who have allegedly encroached on forest land “till the recognition and verification procedure is complete”. Violating these forest rights has been described as an atrocity under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989 since 2016. Yet courts and officials have continued to breach this principle. Nowhere does the FRA produce a requirement that other traditional forest dwellers have to have occupied the land they are claiming for three generations (75 years) before 2005. Nor does the Act prohibit commercial activities on all forest lands or cultivating commercial crops there. In fact, the FRA defines “bonafide livelihood needs” to include the “sale of surplus produce arising out of exercise of such rights”. It also explicitly permits grazing on all forest lands. Yet the administration and the judiciary have hampered the FRA’s implementation on these dubious grounds.
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