New guidelines by green ministry violates own law

The Environment ministry has violated the law, Forest Rights Act (FRA), it used to denying bauxite mining for Vedanta Resources in Orissa, by allowing declaration of critical wildlife habitats without scientific assessment of the same.

Updated on: Feb 13, 2011, 24:45:02 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

The Environment ministry has violated the law, Forest Rights Act (FRA), it used to denying bauxite mining for Vedanta Resources in Orissa, by allowing declaration of critical wildlife habitats without scientific assessment of the same.

The ministry on Thursday notified guidelines replacing the October 2007 notification providing financial incentive to the state governments to declare wildlife areas outside the existing 600 protected areas as critical wildlife areas.

The new rules is being seen as a way to underestimate the FRA with the new empowerment of the state governments declaring forest areas as wildlife areas, thereby making application of FRA difficult. And, once that is done the state can relocate people outside the wildlife areas by giving a compensation of upto Rs 10 lakh per family.

For identifying the new Critically Wildlife Habitats (CWH), the rules do not specify the scientific criteria, which are explicitly mentioned in FRA. The forest law clearly states that only those places, where it is proven that the people were hindering protection of wildlife, should be declared as CWHs.

“The process of identification is to be carried out by the district forest officer and a "local scientific institution" in the space of a mere 60 days. The result can only be imagined - exactly as occurred in the case of critical tiger habitats, all existing protected areas will simply be sought to be converted into critical wildlife habitats, followed by pressurising people living inside them to relocate,” said a group representing those living in forests, Campaign for Survival and Dignity.

Moreover, the entire process of relocation to be democratic may not turn so transparent as the entire process is guided by the forest department, who the activists describe as anti-forest dwellers. Another objection to the guidelines is that there is no participation of people representing tribals in the entire process of identification of CWHs and relocation.

While the new rules speak about consent of the gram sabha, the same is negated as the guidelines say that those who agree for relocation should be provided with the compensation package. This could mean pressurizing some people to opt for the compensation package, thereby moving relocation step by step, in violation of FRA.

The new rules are silent without regarding to an important provision in the forest rights act that no relocation should take place unless proper living facilities are provided at the relocate site. People have died in Chhattisgarh and Orissa in recent part after relocated at the site without such facilities.

New guidelines

Forest Rights Act says gram sabha consent for tribal relocation is mandatory; new rule says they only need to be consulted

No scientific criteria to identify critically wildlife habitat

Identification process to be done by forest officer, who activists say are anti-forest dweller.

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

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.