Resource conflicts in India: Forest Rights and Minerals

1. Resource Conflicts:
Forest Rights and Minerals

2. Background
• Land, territories and related resource rights are of fundamental importance to
indigenous communities since they constitute the basis of their economic livelihood
and are the sources of their spiritual, cultural and social identity.
• Globally, the territories of indigenous communities overlap with the rich bio-diverse
and resource rich areas. Their identity, traditional practices, customary laws, and
livelihood are tightly inter-linked to their land and natural resources.
• These forest and nature-dependent communities are increasingly coming in conflict
with their respective governments and powerful corporations due to the rise in
urbanisation, changing economic factors, and push for mega projects across the
globe, thereby making it more difficult for them to secure their basic rights and access
to land and natural resources.

3. Factors
Conflicts over natural resources are not a new phenomenon. A series of factors substantially exacerbate
conflicts over natural resources. The following list gives an overview of such factors:
• In most cases, natural resources have more than one user. Without clear agreements and/or legal
status, this opens doors for conflicts, which reflect the power relations between users.
• Economic and population growth, combined with the destruction of ecosystems leads to a situation
where competition over resources increases. Such conditions can easily exacerbate the potential for
conflicts.
• A richness in natural resources can increase corruption and create a so-called “resource curse”. Here,
conflicts between state officials or companies on one side and rural people and their organisations on
the other side are likely to occur.
• Political changes in many countries, especially in fragile contexts, can create new aspirations in terms
of exploitation of resources. Functioning institutions, arrangements and regulations are especially
necessary in such situations.
• Official laws regarding natural resources management often do not match with traditional indigenous
user rights and regulations, thus causing conflicts between government officials and local users.
• Privatisation policies of common natural resources or services can trigger serious (political) conflicts
within a society (e.g. land grabbing).

4. • In 1865 the first Indian Forest Act was passed. It came into effect on 1 May 1865. The Act
empowered the Government to declare any land covered with trees as Government
forests and to issue rules for conserving them. This was the first attempt at forest
legislation by the British in India.
• A revised Indian Forest Act was passed in 1878 and was extended to all provinces of
British India with the exception of Madras and some other areas. This Act aimed at
improving on the inadequacies of the Indian Forest Act of 1865. This Act classified the
forests into reserved forests, protected forests and village forests. The rights of the people
over forest lands and produce in the reserved and protected forests were restricted and
regulated by this Act. It empowered the Government to exercise control over the forests.
• The Indian Forest Act, 1927 was largely based on previous Indian Forest Act of 1878.
The act sought to consolidate and reserve the forested areas to regulate movement and
transit of forest products, and duty leviable on timber and other forest products. It also
defined the procedure for declaring an area to be a Reserved Forest, a Protected Forest
or a Village Forest. The act also included various restrictions on access to the forest
products inside the reserved forests and strict penalties for violation of law.
Colonial Legacy of Forest Policies in India

5. • During the colonial period, tribal communities were alienated from their historical
rights when the British used the forests for commercial purposes. Even after
independence, the management of forest remained the responsibility of the forest
department whereas, the real owners – forest-dwelling tribes – kept away from the
resources that originally belonged to them and who were also the de facto
conservators of the woods that they worshipped.
• After the Independence, in 1952, a new Forest Policy (National Forest Policy
1952) was announced which was considered necessary to balance changes that
occurred during the period since the enunciation of first forest policy in 1894. This
policy of 1952 largely removed the defects in the earlier policy. Various vital
changes in Policy direction were indicated in this new policy, including expanded
attention towards contribution of forestry in Industrial development. The priority
that had been given to agricultural contemplations in the 1894 policy was
considerably updated.
Post-Colonial Forest Policies in India

6. • Under the NFP of 1952, village forests were used to serve the requirements of the surrounding
villages in respect of small timber for housing and agricultural implements, firewood, leaves for
manure and fodder, grazing, etc. These forests were to be managed mainly to meet the wants
of the local population.
• The forest Policy of 1988, for the first time, provided for involving of people, especially women,
for catering its objectives. Also, while addressing the needs of the communities depending on
the forests, the policy also pointed the proper management of the non-timber based products.
The policy along with Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 helped in stabilisation of country’s forest
area over the last two decades in spite of huge demand on forest land for development and the
ever increasing pressure for forest produces. Thus, the 1988 National Forest Policy (NFP) was
evolutionary and visionary in its scope and ambition, where priority was given to maintaining the
“ecological balance of the nation as vital for sustenance of all life forms.

7. Resource Conflicts in India
• Today, indigenous peoples’ rights to lands, territories and other natural resources are
recognised by international laws and articulated under human rights instruments;
however, despite the recognition and protection at the international level, these rights
are often not respected and are even violated – at the national level, either by States or
the private sector.
• Similar to the global trend, the rights of tribal and other forest-dwelling communities in
India, who constitute eight per cent (2011 Census) of the country’s population, are also
being expropriated, leaving them further marginalised.
• The consecutive policies in India have failed to recognise the forest-dependent
communities and their rights to land and natural resources. By handing over control of
forest land to Forest Department, the government has not only branded the forest-
dependent communities as ‘encroachers’ in their own land, but has also legally
alienated them.

8. Naxalite-Maoist Insurgency in India
• The Naxalite–Maoist insurgency is an ongoing conflict between Maoist groups
known as Naxalites, and the Indian government. The Naxal affected areas are tribal
dominated districts in the interiors of the states where the administrative architecture
and development has not reached. The discontent among the population of these areas
is on the matters of rights to lands, forests, mining, social discrimination and
development.
• The Naxalites operate in 60 districts in India, mainly in the states of Odisha (5 affected
districts), Jharkhand (14 affected districts), Bihar (5 affected districts), Andhra Pradesh
(10 affected districts), Chhattisgarh (10 affected districts), Madhya Pradesh (8 affected
districts), Maharashtra (2 affected districts) and West Bengal (8 affected districts).

9. Naxalism is the outcome of various political and economic factors. They are as follows:
• Poverty, economic inequality and underdevelopment,
• The Skewed distribution of land,
• Encroachment of forest lands by and wealth controlled by contractor-politician nexus,
• The entry of mining companies in Tribal areas and forests, posing a threat to the
livelihood of the tribals,
• Indigenous tribal population deprived of their lands, uprooted from their traditional
source of livelihood. Globalisation accused to have led many MNCs making inroads in
tribal areas owing to their resource richness. The benefits of resource exploitation are
not passed on the tribals.
• Well knitted linkage between the illegal mining industry in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand
which results in a lucrative source of earning for the Naxal leadership and cadres.

11. • The Indian aboriginals, known as adivasis, live in the forested areas which are being transferred
in the hands of corporate companies for profit maximisation. The conflict between economic
progress and aboriginal land rights continues to fuel the Naxalite’s activities. Arundhati Roy, a
Naxalite sympathiser said that the tribal forestlands should be called a “MoUist Corridor”
instead of the “Maoist Corridor” as the people of these tribal forest lands have been wrestling
with Memorandum of Understanding (MoUs) of the mining companies.
• Forest dwellers have been denied rights to the forestland they use since colonial times. For
British rulers, forest was a source of revenue, which drove their timber trade. So, anyone who
inhabited or used forest was termed an encroacher. Independent India perpetuated the same
approach for nearly six decades, but the Forest Rights Act was passed in 2006 to correct this
“historical injustice”.
Tribal Grievances in India

12. • THE SCHEDULED TRIBE AND OTHER TRADITIONAL FOREST DWELLERS
(RECOGNITION OF FOREST RIGHTS) ACT, 2006
• The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest
Rights) Act, 2006 was passed almost unanimously by the Lok Sabha as well as the
Rajya Sabha on December 18, 2006. This legislation, aimed at giving ownership
rights over forestland to traditional forest dwellers. The law concerns the rights of
forest dwelling communities to land and other resources, denied to them over
decades as a result of the continuance of colonial forest laws in India. The list of rights
as provided under the Act includes:
Right to live in the forest under the individual or common occupation for habitation or
for self-cultivation for livelihood,
Right to access, use or dispose of minor forest produce
Tribal Grievance Redressal in India

13. Rights of entitlement such as grazing and traditional seasonal resource access
Rights for conversion of leases or grants issued by any local authority or any state
government on forest lands to titles
Right to protect, regenerate or conserve or manage any community forest resource.
• Rehabilitation and Resettlement Policy, 2007 : The main aim of this act is to minimise the
displacement of people and to promote non-displacing or least displacing alternatives. The
Government issued a rehabilitation policy on 11 October 2007 for easy displacement of people
who lose their land for industrial growth. The policy include provision of alternate land for
displaced people , job prospective to at least one member of the family, vocational training and
housing benefits including houses to people in rural areas and urban areas.

14. • In 2013, villagers from Niyamgiri hills (Rayagada district, Odisha) with the help of of social
activists protested against Vedanta company for establishing an aluminium plant in the district. The
primary raw material for aluminium is bauxite which has a large reserve in the district. People filled
a petition in the supreme court regarding the threat of livelihood and health impacts from the
refinery and in 2013, Supreme Court asked the gram sabhas in the region to decide whether or not
to allow the mining. The gram sabhas unanimously rejected the mining project.
• In Alnar village of Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district, 32 hectares of land was acquired for iron ore
mining. The government claims that 91 people participated in the public hearing to clear the project.
However, local residents say none of those who participated in the public hearing were from Alnar.
The residents claim that they were not given any notice about the public hearing, which was a
violation of Forest Rights Act of 2006. As of January 2020, the case was still pending with the State
Government and no mining activity has started.
Activism for Resource Rights in India: Case Studies

15. •There are at least 33 cases from Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and Telangana in
which forest departments have been forcing plantations on the land claimed by the
forest dwellers. The FRA prohibits any activity, even by the government, on the land
claimed by the forest dwellers without prior consent from the village council concerned.
In most of the cases, no consent was taken before plantation.
• Similarly, conflicts are happening in tiger reserves because the forest department has
been forcibly evicting tribal communities from the forest in the name of relocation to
create inviolate spaces for wildlife. As many as 27 such cases have been reported by
Land Conflict Watch from 13 states so far. In some of the 27 cases, including
Achanakmar tiger reserve in Chhattisgarh, communities have been barred from
accessing firewood and minor forest produce such as Mahua flowers on which they
depend for livelihood. In March 2017, the National Tiger Conservation Authority
passed an order that effectively stopped the process of settlement of forest rights act in
tiger reserves.

16. References:
• http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/6session_opening_statement_vtc.doc
• http://www.helvetas.org/en/switzerland/what-we-do/our-topics/governance-peace-migration/conflict-
transformation/natural-resources-and-conflict
• http://thelawbrigade.com/environmental-law/forest-laws-in-india-policy-and-assessment/
• https://javedrashid.blogspot.com/2018/09/indias-maoists-movement.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naxalite–Maoist_insurgency
• https://vamshikrishnablog.wordpress.com/2015/08/04/naxalism-the-biggest-security-threat-to-india/
• https://idsa.in/jds/4_2_2010_NaxaliteMovementinIndia_rdixit
• https://www.indiaspend.com/how-govts-across-india-are-violating-forest-rights-31750/