On 3rd May 2002, the Environment and Forest Ministry of the Central Govt. issued a directive to remove all encroachments from forestlands. While issuing this directive, reference was made to the Supreme Court’s order of 21st November 2001. Since 1995, the ‘Godavarman Thirugampadu vs. Indian Union of India’, also known as the ‘Forest Case’ has been pending before the Supreme Court. In this case, the Supreme Court set up a Central Empowered Committee of Bureaucrats. This Committee recommended clearing out of all encroachments after 1980, on the basis of which the Supreme Court asked the Central Govt. to submit an ‘Action Report’. In the light of this, the Environment and Forest Ministry of the Central Govt. issued the directive of 3rd May 2002 directing all state governments to clear all encroachments by 30th September 2002. On top of it, the Supreme Court banned ‘podu agriculture’ in forest areas, while it is the widely used means of subsistence by tribals.

If the Supreme Court order is implemented, the around one crore tribals living in the forests of India will be deprived of their livelihood. The way this order, which will play havoc on such a massive scale with the lives of the most poor and backward section of society, has been issued illustrates well the anti-poor attitude of the Supreme Court and the Central Govt. in the period of the ‘new economic policies’.

The basis of the above order of the Supreme Court is the harm being caused to the environment by these encroachments in the forests. It is worth noting that the brunt of the Supreme Court’s love for environment is always borne by the poorest and neglected sections of society. They may be the workers of the small-scale sector industries in a city like Delhi, or the tribals residing in the forests of the country!

It would be relevant to look a little more deeply into this issue of ‘environment’, about which the judges of the Supreme Court, the World Bank, the officials of Indian Govt., a section of intellectuals and the NGOs working for ‘social welfare’ are so agitated. Harm is done to the environment by the pollutant chemical gases mainly being produced by industrial establishments, as these gases harm the protective ozone layer around the Earth. This protective ozone mantle blocks the harmful section of radiations from the Sun from reaching the Earth; thus the amount of such radiation reaching the Earth will increase if the layer is depleted. On the other hand, there is a danger of global warming due to increasing pollution, and due to this there is danger of the ice at the poles melting leading to swelling of the seas/oceans and danger of some parts of the earth being overlaid by water.

Big trees, in the course of their metabolic activity, purify some of these polluted gases emitted by the industries and render them harmless. In this way forests regulate our environment. Thus the question of protecting the environment is a question of balance between the harm caused to it due to industries and the need of forest cover in adequate amount to purify it. To present this question one-sidedly is to give all rights to destroy the environment to the big industries and developed countries, and put the responsibility of protecting it on the poor inhabiting the forests and on the backward countries of the world.

USA alone is responsible for the production of one-fourth of the world’s polluting gases. The G-8 countries together are responsible for producing about three fourths of them. But USA is not ready to cut down the level of polluting gases being produced by it; rather it is not ready for any curbs on its own industrial production (the source from which these polluting gases emanate). They have refused to follow the environment related “Quoto Declaration”. Other industrially developed countries also advocate cutting down of pollution by all countries, while they themselves are responsible for it. In this way, they want to transfer their burden onto the third world countries and finish off even the possibilities of their industrial development, whereas third world countries are not responsible for the imbalances in the environment.

On the other hand, the World Bank, an US controlled organization of imperialist countries, is forcing such environment related policies on third world countries which are against their agricultural and industrial developments. The NGOs, nurtured by the World Bank and imperialist countries, make a noise in India and third world countries about environmental conservation and in this way serve the interests of their patrons. The World Bank is giving aid of crores of rupees to displace the tribals and non-tribal poor living in the forests from there in the name of protecting forests in India.

Never was there any threat to environment from the tribals and their agriculture and there is none now. The tribals have been living in the forests for thousands of years and have been protecting them. In reality the work of destroying forests is being done by the nexus of ruling politicians, officers, forest officials and contractors. MNCs and comprador big capitalists have destroyed a big section of forests. Recently in the Balco case, the Supreme Court gave consent to handing over the land acquired from tribals to private capitalists in the name of ‘govt. enterprise’, and in this way flouted the rights of the tribals and other poor of that area not only for government enterprise but also for the profits of big capitalists.

Encroachments

Andhra Pradesh                                           3.413 lakh hectares

Assam                                                         2.547 lakh hectares

Chattisgarh                                                  1.504 lakh hectares

Karnataka                                                   1.090 lakh hectares

Maharashtra                                                0.936 lakh hectares

Orissa                                                          0.756 lakh hectares

Madhya Pradesh                                          0.728 lakh hectares

Kerala                                                         0.459 lakh hectares

Jharkhand                                                    0.339 lakh hectares

Uttar Pradesh                                              0.252 lakh hectares

Uttaranchal                                                  0.104 lakh hectares

As far as the protection of forests is concerned there are nearly 8 crore hectares of forestland in our country. On this land there is forest cover on less than half of the area. Even if the govt. statistics regarding encroachments are relied upon, even then such land is only a few lakh hectares. Who has stopped the Govt. and the Supreme Court from developing forests on the rest of the land under the forest department?

As far as the issue of farming by tribals is concerned (more than 80% of the tribals are dependent on farming), “podu farming” has also been going on in forest areas since a long, long time, and no harmful gases are produced due to it. If it is necessary to protect forests in order to protect the environment, why is the burden of this being put on the shoulders of the tribals alone?

Campaign of World Bank

The eagerness of the World Bank for the ‘conservation’ of forests in India is worth paying attention to. The World Bank has brought out a document for the ‘protection’ of the forests of Andhra Pradesh, which the Bank acknowledges as a ‘Reforming State’ i.e. implementing reforms. According to this document the main danger to the forests is from “Podu farming in forest areas, occupation of forestlands, use of fuel wood and grazing by domestic animals.” (Page 20) From this it is clear that in the name of conserving forests the target of the World Bank are the tribals living in the forest areas. Where on the one hand the repressive machinery of the state is being relied on to evict the tribals and poor people from forestlands, on the other there are attempts to entice them. For this, the document talks of ‘provision of clear drinking water’, and ‘local health facilities’ etc. By linking the provision of drinking water and basic health facilities to the vacation of forest land, the Govt. and its patrons – imperialist agencies like World Bank – only show their bankruptcy. Are provisions of clean drinking water and health facilities not the constitutional responsibilities of the government?

Though on the one hand the Govt. and the World Bank say there will be no forcible eviction of people residing in the forests, on the other, they are conspiring to rob them of their means of subsistence, forest produce and land. How can the tribal and poor people live in the forests if they cannot do farming and cannot use the forest resources, is something only the Govt. leaders and World Bank can tell.

The essence of the above plan of the World Bank is to deprive the tribals and other poor people of land for farming. There is provision to hire some of them as casual labourers to look after the forests but the majority will be forced to hire themselves out as workers for a pittance, as there is no other means of subsistence.

The Conspiracy of Imperialism and Comprador Rulers Against Tribals

The approximately 10 crore tribals living in large parts of India had been victims of the conspiracies of the colonial rulers for a long time. Where the British colonialists ended the natural rights of the tribals over the forests by making Forest Laws, there they also brought settlers from other areas with the aim of collecting land revenue thereby giving rise to a class of landlords from among the outsiders. Against this colonial policy, the colonial rulers, and against these non-tribal landlords and contractors, the tribal peasantry waged heroic struggles. The Santhal Revolt, the Revolt under the leadership of Birsa Munda, the struggle led by Alluri Seetaramaraju and other struggles of the tribal peasantry hold important positions in the glorious heritage of anti-colonial struggles of the people of India. In the course of these struggles, the colonial rulers framed laws for the protection of tribals’ lands but must of these laws remained confined to paper and in reality the colonialists kept up encouragement to compradors, landlords and contractors.

After 1947, the Indian rulers kept up the old policy in tribal areas. The nexus of ruling politicians, bureaucracy, landlords and contractors kept on exploiting these areas and by occupying more and more forest land increased landlessness among the tribals. On the other hand the brunt of Government developmental projects was also borne by the tribals and non-tribal poor. The areas where they live are rich in natural resources – mineral, coal, and source of water. The projects established here only gave casual or unskilled employment opportunities to the tribals whereas tribals and other poor were displaced in large numbers. The question of rehabilitation remained only on paper, while the displaced people were knocked about from pillar to post.

The current attack on tribals and non tribal poor being directed by World Bank is the current face of the long continuing attacks by imperialism and its comprador domestic reactionaries on the poor inhabiting the forests. Not only has this attack been intensified, in a way, undeclared war has been launched against the tribals.

The limit of the Forest Act 1980 is Meaningless

The decision of the Supreme Court and the Central Govt. directive have both taken the Central Forest Law 1980 as the cut off point i.e. the encroachments after 1980 are to be evicted. On this the Central Empowered Committee has said that documentary proof has to be provided of occupation prior to 1980. Many state Govts. have clearly acknowledged that they have no records of occupations prior to 1980. It is worth remembering that tribals have no proofs of being owners of their land even though they have been occupying it for scores of years. In 1990 the Central Govt. had passed orders regularizing the land-occupations of tribals and in 1985 the Supreme Court too had given a similar judgement but no Govt. woke up at that time. But now there is hectic preparation for eviction of the tribals. In fact if the courts give any judgment which gives some gain to the poor, it is thrown into the dustbin, but the decisions of courts to evict the poor is wielded as a stick.

Expose the Conspiracies, Resist the Attack

The tribals are perturbed by the directive of the Supreme Court, and they are not willing to give up their lands at any cost. They have a proud history of several struggles and are willing for any sacrifice to defend their basic rights. Even the Govt. and World Bank do not fancy this eviction to be an easy task. Communist revolutionaries are working in these areas for a long time and are leading struggles against contractors, landlords and forest officials. The World Bank considers the Communist Revolutionaries (Naxalites), whom it identifies as anti-socials, as impediments in the way of its realizing its aims. The Chief Minister of AP, Chandra Babu Naidu, labels Naxalites as a big impediment in the way of foreign capital investment. The Central Home Minister, Advani, has declared the Naxalites as enemies of the India of the RSS-BJP’s dreams i.e. a ‘Hindu Rashtra’.

The Communist Revolutionaries are definitely opposing the campaign to evict the tribals and non-tribal poor and are exposing the conspiracies of the ruling classes and World Bank. They are trying to unite all struggling forces in opposing this attack and are preparing the tribals and non-tribal poor living in the forests to resist implementation of these orders. They are fully determined to challenge the conspiracies of imperialism and domestic reaction against the tribals.