Today 9th of August is the International Indigenous People's Day. In India this day is doubly memorable because this was the day in 1942 that the Quit India Movement against the British was launched. I attended a programme today in Bhopal that sought to focus on the non-implementation of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Rights)Act 2006. This legislation which is popularly known as the Forest Rights Act or FRA was purportedly enacted to correct the historical injustice perpetrated against indigenous people in this country from British times of denying them the rights to the lands and forests they have traditionally been in possession of. The tribals were deprived mainly due to their being an oral culture with no written records. However, in practice despite this legislation the administration has continued to deny justice to the tribals. Speaker after speaker detailed how their applications for right recognition had been rejected and how they were being forcibly evicted from their lands and in some cases even being jailed on false charges.
The Khedut Mazdoor Chetna Sangath too has been conducting a long drawn campaign for the implementation of this Act over the past three years or so and yet many of its members have been denied rights as their claims have been rejected in an illegal manner. The KMCS is comparatively strong on the ground and has taken sound legal steps throughout and so is in a position to challenge the illegality of the administration in the courts. But for most tribals in this country this is not the case and they are once again being defrauded by the administration. There was tremendous anger among the tribals as they spoke but there seemed to be a hopelessness also. They said that some of them had been fighting for over three decades and had thought that at last they would get their rights when the legislation was enacted. But this hope had been belied.
The symbolism of celebrating indigenous people's day cannot achieve much unless there is an overall social movement against the global forces that continue to marginalise the tribals.
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