NAC to examine effect of developmental interventions and constitutional safeguards on tribal people

NAC to examine effect of developmental interventions and constitutional safeguards on tribal people

Tamil NewsYesterday,

The Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) will examine whether developmental interventions and constitutional safeguards — including Fifth Schedule provisions — have come to the aid of tribal people in Left Wing Extremism (LWE)-affected districts in central India. An NAC Working Group (WG) headed by tribal expert Professor Virginius Xaxa — who also heads the Prime Minister's high level committee that is to produce a report on the socio-economic condition of tribal people — will hold its first meeting on the subject on September 23. It is expected to zero in on "the issue of displacement arising from the various development and mining projects and wild life sanctuaries, and issues such as atrocities, redressal of undertrials, etc." The key question the agenda papers for the NAC's WG meeting poses is whether "industry, mineral exploitation and other infrastructure development projects that displace tribal communities are to be invariably resisted? Or to be worked out, ensuring overall interest of the tribal communities [livelihood security, environment, culture, improved quality of life etc]?"
The NAC's WG meeting coincides with the CPI (Maoist) Central Committee's recent admission that the organisation's strength — whether manpower, arms and ammunition, or support of the middle-class and intellectuals — stands depleted, even though sporadic Maoist attacks continue to be reported from the region. Meanwhile, the high-level committee, set up last month by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, to prepare a position paper on the socio-economic, health and educational status of tribal people, has also been asked to look at the controversial issue of mining in Schedule Five areas in central India.

On September 9, when members of the PM's high-level committee met union tribal affairs minister Kishore Chandra Deo, the minister urged the members to pay attention to this issue, as mining by private companies in Schedule Five areas has had an adverse impact on the lives, livelihoods and health of the tribal people, such as in Odhisha's Keonjhar district. Mr. Deo also asked them to pay special attention to the manner in which money from the Tribal Sub-Plan is disbursed by the various ministries — in many cases, government sources said, these monies are used as discretionary funds rather than being used "to fill the critical gaps."

In recent months, the UPA government — and now the NAC — has once again begun to lay special emphasis on the condition of tribal people: the PM's high level committee is expected to produce a report similar to the one the Sachar Committee did on Muslims, ahead of the general elections in 2014. The NAC's WG background note for the September 23 meeting admits that tribal people "have veered in some areas to left radicalism either as cadres or sympathisers and supporters due to their exploitation and oppression by traders, money lenders, land grabbers…and absence of effective and sensitive civil administration." The large scale displacement of tribal people in recent years, it says, "has reinforced the discontent… widespread in these areas for decades." This has happened, it continues, "despite the special Constitutional and legal provisions for the protection of the tribal people in the Fifth Schedule," as well as a slew of other laws. The note then lists three perspectives on LWE: It can be treated "as a national security problem to be addressed militaristically... (that) could result in… widening the trust deficit, (and) end up strengthening the Maoists," something the country can "least afford"; or the focus can be on the development approach that "co-relates the roots of Maoist influence in the areas to governance and development deficit"; or "a judicious combination of both the above perspectives" can be deployed.

The note asks the WG to "assess the impact of special programmes for the LWE areas, being implemented over the past 5-6 years"; "review the implementation of provisions under the Fifth Schedule and PESA, 1996 and Scheduled Tribe and Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006, Prevention of Atrocities Act."

The mix of lawyers, activists and sociologists invited to the NAC's WG meeting include Ajay Dandekar, Nandini Sundar, Himanshu Kumar, Professor Hargopal, Prafulla Samantara, Dayamani Barla, Sudha Bhardwaj, Sudhir Pattnaik, Abhay Xaxa, Bela Bhatia, Pradip Prabhu, Chitrangada Chaudhary, Vipul Mudgal and C.R. Bijoy.

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