The Union tribal affairs ministry has stressed the need for implementation of Forest Rights Act in time-bound manner and urged the states to complete the preliminary work for identification of beneficiaries by the mid-March. In the two-day meeting of state tribal development secretaries concluded here on Tuesday, Union tribal secretary G.B. Mukherji said the Centre accorded high priority to implement Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006 and urged the states to draw up action plan and to set up effective monitoring mechanism at various levels for continuous review of the implementation of the act. Chairing the meeting, Mr Mukherji reviewed the progress of the implementation of the act so far and explained various points related with its implementation. The meeting was also addressed by secretary, ministry of panchayati raj and senior officials of the ministry of environment and forests. Making presentations of the preparatory actions already taken towards the implementation of the Forest Rights Act, most of the states ensured that exercise of convening Gram Sabha meetings would be initiated from February 28 and will be completed by mid of the next month. The actionable points for the states and the roles of the ministries of environment and forests and panchayati raj as envisaged in the act were also explained in the meeting. The representative of the ministry of environ ment and forest pointed out that the Forest Rights Act was also recently discussed in a meeting of the state forest secretaries/PCCFs/CWLWs organised by the ministry last week. He explained the role of the ministry of environment and forests in implementation of the act and highlighted certain issues from the forestry angle. Secretary (panchayati raj) said the provisions of the Forest Rights Act and the rules framed thereunder were in complete harmony with the PESA Act and the act needed to be implemented in its letter and spirit. During the meeting, performance of the states in implementation of two other important programmes of the ministry, namely the Special Central Assistance to Tribal Sub-Plan and utilisation of grants for various tribal welfare schemes was reviewed.