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Soren launches campaign to distribute title documents to forest dwellers
The campaign, known as ‘Abua Bir Dishom Abhiyan’, aims to process all pending applications from forest dwellers and grant them land pattas (land ownership) in the next few months, officials familiar with the developments said on Monday.
Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren on Monday launched a campaign to distribute land pattas (title documents) to forest dwellers under the provisions of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006, which provides for the recognition of the rights of communities dependent on forest land for their livelihood.
The campaign, known as ‘Abua Bir Dishom Abhiyan’, aims to process all pending applications from forest dwellers and grant them land pattas (land ownership) in the next few months, officials familiar with the developments said on Monday.
“The distribution of land pattas under the Forest Right Act of 2006 should have been done much earlier. The Act was implemented 17-18 years ago, but the rights under the Act were neglected in the state. We are launching this campaign mode after overcoming several obstacles. Our goal is to distribute land pattas to all rightful tribals and forest dwellers under this campaign,” said Soren.
According to the officials, 12,514 forest dwellers and tribals residing in 36,620 villages across the forested areas of Jharkhand will benefit from this campaign.
Urging all deputy commissioners and district forest officers attending the workshop at the state secretariat, Soren said that the results of the exercise would become visible in a decade.
Soren further said that officials have advised the relevant departments to disseminate information about the rights provided to people living in forest areas under the Forest Rights Act of 2006 through various means of publicity and that the scheduled tribe, scheduled caste, minority, and backward class welfare department should prepare a comprehensive outline of the forest rights campaign and work to expedite the campaign.
He added that to implement the scheme, forest rights committees (FRC) are being established at the village, sub-division, and district levels and are provided with all the necessary records.
