Is the Telangana government in its zeal for creating smaller districts for better administration inadvertently diluting the protective legislation meant for the welfare of Adivasis?
Human Rights Forum (HRF), a citizens’ forum working for the protection of Constitutionally guaranteed and internationally recognised rights of the people, says the proposed reorganisation of districts by disintegrating adivasi dominant areas and merging them with the plain areas may end up rendering the vulnerable adivasi communities helpless and jeopardise their rights.
The adivasi areas are included in Schedule 5 of the Constitution with a specific objective to provide them protection from alienation of their lands and natural resources to non-adivasis. But this constitutional safeguard is under threat because of the reorganisation of districts, the Forum points out. Any move to merge the mandals of Fifth Schedule as well as Tribal Sub-Plan villages with the plain areas will go against the very spirit of the Constitution, it says.
The Forum members who extensively toured the adivasi areas of the Fifth Schedule spread over the districts of Adilabad, Karimnagar, Warangal, Khammam, Nalgonda and Mahbubnagar said the State government has overlooked the fact that the adivasi resident in the Fifth Schedule areas are possessed of a unique history, culture, traditions and dispute resolution systems. It would also go against the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas Act) 1996, (PESA) that gave adivasis right to self rule, they asserted. Detailing the deviations from the objectives of Fifth Schedule and the anomalies in the draft notification of proposed new districts, HRF State president S.Jeevan Kumar and general secretary V.S.Krishna submitted a representation to the Chief Commissioner for Land Administration and urged the government not to go ahead with the ongoing district reorganisation process without a wide ranging consultation process, particularly with Adivasi society.
The formation of new and reorganisation of districts to decentralise administration and take it closer to people is a laudable efforts. But any such exercise has to be transparent and respectful of the unique situation of the adivasis. The specific rights and protections accorded to them through Constitution be fully respected and sincere efforts be made to obtain the informed consent of the adivasis and not make them sacrificial lambs to a larger non-adivasi view point.
