A huge land grab is threatening India’s tribal people. They need global help.

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Adivasi have lived in the nation’s forests for millennia. But now, under the spurious guise of conservation, millions face eviction.

‘Adivasi tribal people make up 9% of India’s 1.2 billion population.’ Photograph: Alamy
▼ About 8 million indigenous people in India are in danger of  being evictedfrom forests that their ancestors have lived in for millennia. This grave injustice follows a shocking supreme  court rulingthat rides roughshod over the rights of India’s indigenous people, known as Adivasi, or tribals.
According to the 2011 census, these tribal people number 104 million – almost 9% of the country’s then 1.2 billion population. It is the largest indigenous population in any country in the world, occupying 22% of India’s geographical terrain.
A number of Indian wildlife and conservation organisations, including Wildlife First, the Wildlife Trust of India, and the Tiger Research and Conservation Trust have accused the tribal people of destroying the forests’ biodiversity and have petitioned the court to clear them from the land. Yet the 2006 Forest Rights  Actgave Adivasi rights to live on and protect the land that they had been cultivating within forest boundaries.
The debate about wildlife versus forest dwellers is an old one. But most Indian NGOs understood years ago that the Adivasis were not the enemy, and they have been fighting on the same side. Having lived with my family in a forested area for three and a half decades, I know that the people live in harmony with nature and that evicting tribals will leave the forest unguarded and vulnerable – and make it a haven for poachers.
The Forest Rights Act undid historic injustices perpetrated on the communities of forest dwellers for centuries. It has empowered tribal councils to reject planning applications by mineral companies, such as UK-based Vedanta, to mine for bauxitein the Niyamgiri hills.
But under the act, tribal people had to file a claim with state governments to secure the title deeds to their lands – and thousands of claims by Adivasis have been rejected all over India. The country’s highest court has now decreed they are “encroachers” and should be evicted.
States have been told to begin evictions by July if tribes cannot produce documented evidence proving ownership. How can people who did not have paper, who did not know they had to have written entitlement to live on land their ancestors occupied, be expected to produce relevant title deeds? (▪ ▪ ▪)

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