NAC member trashes Centre's tribal policy

The National Advisory Council headed by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has decided to examine governance issues in tribal areas after N.C. Saxena, a member, presented a stinker detailing the failure of central ministries in improving basic "living standards".

Updated on: Aug 19, 2010, 24:19:43 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The National Advisory Council headed by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has decided to examine governance issues in tribal areas after NC Saxena, a member, presented a stinker detailing the failure of central ministries in improving basic "living standards".

Tribal discontent had made headlines following the Maoist attack in Dantewada in Chhattisgarh, after which the Centre proposed a plan of Rs 14,000 crore to remove the "development deficit" in 60 rebel-affected districts. The cabinet is expected to approve the plan soon.

The council last month constituted a sub-group headed by environmentalist Madhav Gadgil to examine the draft tribal policy of the tribal affairs ministry and make recommendations to the government regarding changes in policies detrimental to tribal development.

Terming displacement of farmers the biggest cause of disenchantment, Saxena, in his note for the NAC, said 85.39 lakh tribals had been displaced since 1990 for mega projects, constituting 56 per cent of India’s total displaced population.

"Since 1980, 9.8 lakh hectares of forestland have been diverted for 11,282 projects," he said, giving the example of Orissa where 54-56 per cent of tribal land has been lost to non-tribals over 25-30 years.

The note, which accused central ministries --- tribal affairs, rural development and panchayati raj – of failing to implement government schemes for tribals stating that India’s most poor, illiterate and malnourished live in tribal areas.

Both illiteracy and malnourishment in tribal areas are over 50 per cent (higher than the national average) and consumption of foodgrains has fallen by 10 to 15 per cent in population up to 15 years. "Studies have found that tribal population has showed not much improvement in the food and nutrition intake over time," the note said.

The note will be discussed at the NAC sub-group meeting expected in the first week of September.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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