The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
Union ministry of tribal affairs has asked Odisha state government to raise awareness on this Supreme Court order dated 18 April 2013 that continued the ban on bauxite mining by Vedanta Aluminium in the Niyamgiri Hills. Read text of this order. Supreme Court judgement dated 18/04/2013 in W.P.(C) No.180/2011 Orissa …
Funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) are now being put to a strange use - building walls around government forests! In a letter addressed to chief ministers of states, Tribal Affairs Minister KC Deo has lamented the development saying it’s ironic how MNREGA funds were …
Over 13 lakh trees have been illegally cut in state-owned forests since 2005, depriving Maharashtra of its precious forest wealth. The number of felled trees could be a miniscule fraction of the total tree strength in the state's forests, it is a worrisome drop nonetheless, say forest officials and activists. …
The environment ministry is likely to decide on a second set of key changes in green norms meant for SEZs, roads and the real estate sector, especially multi-storey buildings, next week. The committee it had formed on easing green regulations for clearances impacting these specific industries and sectors has submitted …
Seven years after the Forest Rights Act was enacted, the Centre has found flaws that prevent benefits from percolating to the forest dwellers and tribals. Worried over the execution of one of its flagship legislations, the government has written to all chief ministers, citing specific violations – mostly by forest …
The Act grants legal recognition to the rights of traditional forest dwelling communities The Additional Collector’s headquarter here was abuzz even before its gates opened on Monday morning. Around 100 tribals from various villages in the Jawhar tehsil had already queued to begin what they had aptly named as first …
It manipulates data and facts to make a case against Act Forest rights campaigners have slammed the satellite image-based study on the implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA) in Maharashtra as “deeply faulty and obviously biased,” arguing that it manipulates data and facts to make a case against the …
A Maharashtra forest department study, based on GPS and satellite imagery, shows that "ineligible forest areas are being claimed and granted for land plots (pattas) under the Forest Rights Act." The FRA gives traditional forest dwellers the right over lands they had encroached for farming, subject to a cutoff of …
The government does it purely on the strength of a certificate issued by the district administration Even as the recent affidavit submitted by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) before the Supreme Court in the Vedanta case has caused dismay among tribal communities and activists for the dilution …
The Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) is reconsidering its clearance for the controversial Kalu Dam in Thane district. About 999.328 hectares of forest land in the ecologically sensitive Western Ghats region is up for diversion for the drinking water project for Mumbai …
This is an updated status of state-wise implementation of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 . As per the information collected till 31st, March, 2013, 32,45,369 claims have been filed and 12,81,926 titles have been distributed. Further, 15,824 titles were ready for …
Sloppy implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA) has resulted in large tracts of forests being cut down and claimed as cultivated land in Maharashtra, according to a study. Data shows that in Jalgaon district alone, more than 79 per cent claims over cultivated forest land were apparently on ineligible …
A national consultation on community forest rights (CFR) under the Forest Rights Act (FRA) was organized by Vasundhara and Kalpavriksh, in collaboration with the CFR Learning and Advocacy Group, and Oxfam India in the Indian Social Institute, from 16-17 March, 2013 in Delhi. The consultation was attended by 74 participants, …
Tribal development must for curbing Naxal growth, says Jairam Ramesh For the residents of this tiny non-descript village in Odisha’s Kalahandi-Bolangir-Koraput region, it was a rare celebratory occasion on Sunday when they got back the rights that had been snatched away by the British rulers nearly a century ago. The …
Jamguda (Kalahandi): Transit permit to villagers to procure and sell forest resources will create a revolution in the country as it is an important tool to empower tribal communities, stressed Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh on Sunday while attending the gram sabha at Jamguda, where forest officials in his …
The Forest Rights Act 2006 recognises and secures Community Rights/Community Forest Resources of the communities, in addition to their Individual Rights. The Act came into force from 2008, after FRA rule was framed. The process of formation of different committees from Forest Rights Committee (FRC) to State Level Monitoring Committee …
This study has been done to understand the impact of implementation of Forest Rights Act on the change, after 2005, in tree cover/vegetation and land use in the forest lands under Forest Right’s claims as well as in those with finally recognized ‘Forest Right’ of cultivation. The methodology primarily includes …
The objective of the study was to understand both the ground level situation of CFR implementation and major policy level developments that may be obstructing or strengthening the provision of CFRs, and to provide an assessment based on the collected information about the same. The present report is an attempt …
Administration argues pulling down their huts will ensure ‘safety of wildlife’ A day after the Union government announced a Rs.100-crore grant for Chukutiya Bhunjia of Orissa, a primitive tribe which lives on the eastern border of Chhattisgarh, 30 huts of the Baigas, another primitive tribe, were razed to the ground …
New Delhi: The UPA government is likely to reintroduce the Land Acquisition Bill with a mammoth 157 amendments in the budget session of Parliament. The 26 ‘substantive’ measures the government plans to push through include a provision that in case of acquisition for urbanization purposes, 20% of the developed land …